


Ah, But Underneath

by themillersson



Category: Glee
Genre: Dark, Drugs, Emotional Manipulation, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-25
Updated: 2010-05-25
Packaged: 2017-10-22 04:53:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 8
Words: 21,820
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/233979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/themillersson/pseuds/themillersson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After "Home," Kurt realizes that his father deserves to be happy, but knowing that doesn't make the jealousy and loneliness easier to deal with. Sandy Ryerson appears to offer him an out. (Please read the warnings.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Please read the warnings and tags before reading, and take note of the rating. If you feel the warnings are not sufficient, please let me know and I will add whatever is needed.
> 
> From a prompt at the Glee angst meme.

Kurt’s plan to unite his and Finn’s parents had gone perfectly in certain ways. Burt and Carole were happy, together, and clearly falling for each other. Kurt had gotten many chances to talk with Finn that didn’t involve listening to girl-related woes. And Finn and Burt got along.

The last one was a bit of a bitch, really.

Kurt knew he’d screwed up about five minutes into their first “family dinner” (for the first minute, he’d been able to delude himself into thinking of it as a double date, even if that was really awkward with his dad involved). He was glad that Finn and his father were able to get along, but it made him sick to feel like an intruder in situations with his own father – the only family he really had, the most important person in his life. They’d spent years circling each other awkwardly, and now that they had begun to tentatively bond, Kurt had messed it up again.

And Finn… it hurt to see his crush talk more comfortably to Burt than he ever could to him. Kurt would give him everything if he could, except for this one thing (“You already have my heart, my soul, my entire being,” he sometimes melodramatically imagined saying before realizing his inner monologue sounded like Rachel Berry, “just leave me my father”). Of course, then he always remembered that Finn had grown up without a father at all and he felt like even more of a jerk for begrudging him that. The guilt didn’t erase the dull ache of loss, though.

And somehow, in the course of the whole multi-car pileup of disasters that was his week, he’d managed to also hurt Mercedes. Mercedes, his other half, who’d stood by his side regardless of how many times he messed up. Mercedes, who was there for him through anything. But he’d been too caught up in his own drama and forgot what (who) mattered, withdrawing his support when she really needed it and letting her fall. If Quinn hadn’t been there to catch her, Kurt could never have forgiven himself. As it was, he still hadn’t.

So now he’s standing under the bleachers behind the equipment shed, shifting nervously from foot to foot and making what he knows already is another huge mistake.

“Well, well, what have we here?” A sing-song voice comes from behind him and Kurt manages to keep his cool. He doesn’t jump, just turns around casually to meet the gaze of the world’s most unlikely drug dealer.

Sandy Ryerson is wearing an outfit that Kurt thinks looks like a Lacoste version of an Easter egg – pink shirt, khakis, butter-yellow cardigan tied around his shoulders – and has his hands in his pockets. The older man looks Kurt up and down with over-acted curiosity. Kurt barely notices because he’s too busy paying attention to the football field next to him (the first place he saw his father look openly proud of him, the place where the entire football team lifted him onto their shoulders in victory, the place where anyone could be standing now and seeing how far he’s fallen).

“I’m- I’m here to-“ Kurt has a speech prepared, something flippant and to-the-point, but suddenly he falters and can’t remember it. It’s never happened before, so why is he getting stage fright now?

Sandy seems to take pity on him and heaves a melodramatic sigh. “Poor thing, I understand.” (No you don’t, Kurt wants to say, but is distracted by what he thinks is movement out on the field – a false alarm.) “Life in Lima getting you down? It’s always hardest for the talented ones.”

Kurt looks at him with sharp eyes, no sure if he’s being patronized, but Sandy is exactly this condescending with everyone, so he knows he’s not. And it’s not just the fact that someone called him “talented” for the first time in what feels like forever. He allows a cautious nod and relaxes slightly, though he doesn’t stop scanning the distance for potential witnesses.

“It’s not easy to be different in this little cow town,” Sandy continues pointedly, letting the implication hang in the air, “is it?”

Kurt eyes him warily, but can see nothing but a knowing sort of sympathy on his face, so he allows, “No.” It comes out sounding much more lost than he intends it to, so he clears his throat and stiffly says, “No, it’s not. Which is part of why I’m here.”

“Speaking of which, you look nervous being out here. Do you want to continue this back at my bungalow?” Sandy practically coos, tilting his head to the side in a way that Kurt finds himself doing sometimes (the difference is, when Sandy does it, it looks so much like an attempt to be ingratiating it should be setting off alarm bells except that he’s too distracted and upset to care).

Kurt just nods in relief and follows him, wanting to be away from the football field and its memories and the chance of being caught.

When they arrive at Sandy’s tiny house – Kurt doesn’t know why he alternately refers to it as his “sanctuary, “chateau,” and “estate” the whole way over – Kurt sort of wishes he’d stayed at the football field. There are dolls covering an entire wall and the décor looks like an opium den remodeled by someone’s grandmother. Sandy runs into his “boudoir – just for a second, dollface” and leaves Kurt perching on the edge of a hideously upholstered sofa. He tries very hard not to look at the doll collection as the wait stretches awkwardly on.

When Sandy returns, interrupting Kurt’s inner debate on whether he should chicken out in the face of this new level of creepy, he has one more thing to try to not look at. Kurt suspects that Sandy Ryerson altered the kimono himself, because there can’t be more than one person in the world who thought a robe that short was appropriate on anyone at all. He is distantly proud of himself for not throwing up in his hat. Sandy slides onto the other end of the couch and places two glasses of something – juice? – on crocheted coasters atop the coffee table.

Kurt still sits stiffly, so Sandy laughs and takes a sip of his own drink. “You can relax, dollface. In fact, I assume that you came to me because you needed my help to relax. Now, what are you after?” Sandy leans comfortably against the back of the couch, legs tucked under him and the robe riding up to expose far more thigh than Kurt needs to see.

Averting his gaze from Sandy’s legs to his (overly) sympathetic gaze, Kurt cautiously leans back so that he isn’t sitting ramrod-straight and takes a drink of the too-sweet cranberry juice to stall for a second. When the glass his half empty, he has gathered enough of his usual courage to talk. “I’m looking for something that will take the edge off day-to-day disappointments and make walking into school tolerable. Alcohol doesn’t work, and I don’t want something that will be obvious to anyone else.” As he speaks and slips into ‘business mode,’ he feels his confidence returning. Nose tilted at its usual angle once more, he adds, “If it’s plant-based, organic is a must.”

Sandy nods thoughtfully, regarding Kurt with such intensity that he hurriedly finishes off his drink to avoid it (maybe Sandy looks at everyone that way when he makes deals, maybe it’s nothing, Kurt’s initial assessments have been wrong before).

“I think I have something that will help,” Sandy says with a sudden cheery smile. “But let’s chat for a bit first, shall we?” Apparently, he notices Kurt’s wary look, because he titters. “Oh, you silly doll, I haven’t had company in ages. Is it wrong that I want to take advantage when I do?”

Kurt reluctantly smiles back, the spread of his lips feeling wooden even to him. “Alright, Mr. Ryerson. What would you like to talk about?”

“How about Glee? I miss the days of watching you young people prance about and express yourselves through song.” Kurt is almost positive this is a lie, but he just nods and lets Sandy keep talking. “Some of my happiest days were spent in that music room, playing piano and listening to the students’ dulcet tones. Has William Schuester” the name is said with a sudden ugly twist to Sandy’s lips “run it into the ground yet?”

“No,” Kurt says without thinking, obeying the reflex to immediately deny any slight against Mr. Schue from a non-glee club member. “He’s doing a great job so far.” He cuts himself off and pulls back the praise slightly as he notices his host glowering at him. He doesn’t want to anger the man who might be selling him drugs, Kurt reminds himself (and the whole thing is a bit messed up, isn’t it, when it comes to this). “I mean, he has had some rough patches, but the group is beginning to pull together whether he’s there or not.”

“Has he given you any solos since you had that competition with Miss Berry?” Sandy asks probingly, still apparently looking for a good excuse to start in on the Schuester-bashing. “In my heyday, I would have given you Defying Gravity without a second thought, even though the song isn’t exactly a classic. With your voice, you deserve far more time in the spotlight than he’s given you.”

Kurt is torn between defending Mr. Schuester and lamenting the fact that he often does feel unappreciated when he realizes something. “How did you know about the diva-off?” he asks slowly. “I thought you weren’t allowed…” Finishing the sentence feels unimportant in light of the feeling of cold fear rushing through his veins. His lips are moving more slowly than he meant them to, and his normally sharp tongue feels as useless as the rest of his body. With a great effort, he keeps his head from lolling back so that he can look Sandy in the eye and murmur, “Wha-?”

Sandy chuckles merrily as Kurt loses the battle with gravity and his head does flop back against the sofa. “Oh, dollface, I know about that whole Wicked fiasco because I’ve been keeping an eye on you. You never did Glee when I was in charge, and I always did think that was a shame.” He reaches out a hand to touch Kurt’s cheek and he has just enough control left to jerk away a few inches. Sandy’s eyes darken and he slowly repeats the motion, but this time Kurt is unable to do anything but recline limply on the couch and shudder as Sandy’s hand caresses his face. Sandy looks pleased. “William Schuester may not appreciate you,” he coos, running his fingers along Kurt’s jawline, over his helplessly parted lips, “but I would have made sure to treat you the way you deserve.”

If he were physically capable, Kurt would whimper, scream, run out of the house. Instead, he lays motionless, unable to do more than watch in horror as Sandy carefully removes his prized fedora, placing it neatly on the table and revealing the bedhead that would have embarrassed him at any other time (but which he now irrationally hopes will maybe put Mr. Ryerson off from whatever he’s planning, please let that happen, please let him not be after what it looks like he is).

Instead of being put off, Sandy runs his fingers through the fluffy mess as if entranced. “Oh, I just knew you’d have soft hair,” he says conversationally, sliding so close to Kurt on the couch that his weight dips the cushions and causes the smaller body to slump against him. “My pretty little doll.” Kurt wishes he could push away, but his head is currently resting on Sandy’s silk-clad shoulder and his torso is crumbled awkwardly against Sandy's chest and he is still stroking his hair with one hand. The other hand is unwinding Kurt’s scarf, which soon joins the fedora on the coffee table.

The hand in Kurt’s hair stills and for a miraculous moment he thinks he might be getting a reprieve. Sandy stands up, giggling as Kurt’s body collapses sideways without his support, but Kurt is still hoping that he might get home safe until Sandy says, “Come on, doll, we’ll move this to my boudoir, where I can take care of you properly.” His muscles might be unresponsive, but apparently his tear ducts haven’t been impaired, because by the time Sandy has cradled him in his arms and deposited him on a bed in the other room, Kurt’s cheeks are damp.

Later, Kurt will remember the next two hours (and twenty-six minutes, Kurt can catch glimpses of the time on an alarm clock beside the bed and focuses on it when he can) as a disjointed sequence of images and sensations, mercifully framed by static.

Sandy sits behind him and brushes Kurt’s hair with the wire hairbrush he uses on his dolls. Kurt's body passively rests against Sandy’s chest in between his legs, and he can feel something hot and hard jutting into his lower back through the silk of Sandy’s short robe. Sandy is murmuring something about how pretty he is, what a good boy he’s being. Kurt wants to scream.

Sandy is carefully removing Kurt’s clothes, layer by layer, folding each one as tidily as Kurt would in his own room, and it makes him feel sick.

Hands are sliding all over his body, feeling his skin and skimming every curve and angle-

Sandy is straddling his shoulders, stroking himself with one hand and running the other over Kurt’s face again and again, commenting that he’s “so pale, like a painted china doll” before delicately grasping his chin and maneuvering his mouth forward at the same time he snaps his hips.

…a bitter taste in his throat, drowning out the cloying aftertaste of the drugged drink-

Kurt decides he hates this room even more than the living room. The wallpaper is invisible behind row after row of dolls, and there are glass eyes staring at him from all around and he can do nothing but stare back.

At the fifty-one minute mark, Kurt finds that he can move a little again, and begins to plan desperately. He’ll stay still for a few more minutes until he’s able to stand up, and then he’ll make a run for it, clothes or none. After years of running from jocks and bullies, he has no doubt that he can outpace Sandy once he’s out of the bedroom. Sandy glances at the clock from his place behind Kurt, where he’s taken to stroking Kurt’s hair once more, sighs, and lays him back down on the bed. He leaves the room and Kurt’s heart jumps.

Kurt moves in tiny spasmodic motions, but he doesn’t care how undignified he looks for once and makes it to the edge of the bed before Sandy returns with a syringe, a raised eyebrow, and a disappointed “tsk” noise. “I should have known,” he huffs. Sandy flounces over to seat himself beside Kurt, grabs his weakly twitching arm, and injects him with something that slowly renders him immobile once more. Kurt is able to produce a broken whimper before being totally trapped in his own body.

And it starts again.

The stroking and petting are faster now, and Kurt feels the dread growing in him, knows exactly where this is headed, especially as Sandy flips him onto his stomach and the man’s hands drift down to his ass.

…Kurt hopes desperately that he’ll be allowed to suffocate on the incredibly garish quilt as the sound of a bottle opening echoes over Sandy’s heavy breathing.

There’s pain somewhere he never realized could hurt so fucking bad and the smell of lavender-scented lotion.

He’s being rolled onto his back again after a last pat to his ass. Sandy pulls his fingers out of the immobile body below him and frowns, using his other hand to neaten Kurt’s bangs and tuck the flyaway strands back in place until he’s pleased with the image. Kurt’s vision is taken up by ceiling and innumerable glass eyes and Sandy Ryerson’s contorted face as he positions himself and pushes-

…all he can think is ‘it hurts.’

I’m not here, he thinks, I’m not here I’m not here I’m not-

Sandy abruptly stops moving after an eternity, his face contracting even more, and there’s something wet-

Sandy has pulled out and is cleaning him up with a damp washrag, frowning at the fingerprint-bruises he left on Kurt’s hips. “I feel like I just put scuff marks on porcelain,” he complains, sounding whiny and put-upon. “Thank god I keep my nails trim, can you imagine if there had been scratches? Ugh, gag me.” Kurt continues to stare at the ceiling, unable to move and see anything else.

At the two hours, twenty-six minute mark, Sandy pulls his robe back on and exits the room without a backward look, leaving the door open but turning the light off. As the dark hides him from the unblinking gaze of hundreds of dolls, Kurt considers it a small mercy. He lies there, feeling empty in his own body. The shame and hurt haven’t set in yet; physical pain and overwhelming terror that Sandy will come back leave no room for anything else.

Eventually, he finds that he can move his eyes, then his fingers, then his limbs. He cautiously sits up, making as little noise as possible (he can’t hold back a breathy groan of pain, squeezing his eyes shut as the movement stretches him where he was fucked raw). There’s no response from the rest of the house, although he can hear Sandy clattering around in the kitchen. Kurt swings his legs over the edge of the bed, nearly biting through his lip at the painful pull, but manages to get his clothes on – totally unwrinkled, which he thinks is all wrong for the situation – and is has edged all the way into the living room when Sandy pokes his head around the kitchen doorway and beams at him.

“I thought I heard you get up, babydoll!” His voice freezes Kurt in place, but Sandy makes no attempt to get closer. “Want anything to eat before you go?” Kurt numbly shakes his head, tremors beginning to take hold of his body. Sandy sighs and rolls his eyes exaggeratedly. “Well, alright, then. Go starve for all I care,” he waves a hand at the door, affecting to sulk. “Just don’t forget your hat and scarf, they’re on the coffee table.”

Kurt backs away, shaking, before bolting out the door, leaving his things where they are (up until today it had been his good-luck hat).

He is almost thankful for the walk back to McKinley High, where he left the Navigator. Though he jumps every time a car passes, expecting it to be Sandy returning, the extra time allows him to regain control over his muscles and by the time he reaches the privacy of his baby, he is able to fake his usual strut. He collapses into the driver’s seat and finally allows himself to give in, shaking so hard he thinks he might break into bits, rubbing at his skin furiously as if to obliterate the feeling of Sandy’s hands everywhere. No tears, though. Despite the lingering terror and sharp physical aches, he finds that he isn’t able to cry. The shaking lasts until the sunset, previously bleeding the sky red, is gone and he realizes that he’s sitting alone in a dark parking lot, so he should probably get moving.

He heaves a heavy breath to calm himself and starts up the car, mentally going over excuses for why he’s home so late. Homework, fell asleep in the car after Glee, over at someone’s house (the last one is even technically true). Thankfully, he realizes as he checks out his reflection in the rearview mirror, there aren’t any outward signs of what happened other than the small bruises on his hips. His lips might have been swollen earlier, but now they look perfectly normal (he still hasn’t gotten a first kiss).

He turns off the radio when it starts, “Something has changed within me, something is not the same-”

 

Thankfully, there’s no need for explanations when Kurt gets home. He hears cheering and a loud voice yelling about a touchdown as soon as he walks in the door, and he heaves a sigh of relief. His dad is watching a game, so evidently he wasn’t worrying about Kurt’s whereabouts. The knowledge doesn’t sting like it might have before, and neither does the surprise he gets when he passes through the kitchen and sees Finn sitting with Burt in the den. His father catches sight of him as he passes and gives a jerky nod by way of greeting. “Finn came to visit, said you’d be late,” Burt calls over the sound of screaming football fans. Kurt acknowledges them both with a wave and a little fake smile and continues on his way, in no mood to have his eardrums assaulted any more. He manages to suppress the limp until he’s out of sight.

Kurt knows he should call the police. It’s the only reasonable thing to do in this situation, and there’s still physical evidence on (in) him that could guarantee a conviction and keep Sandy Ryerson from going after anyone else.

If he does go to the police, though, he’ll have to explain what he was doing at Mr. Ryerson’s house, why he sought him out (like an idiot, putting himself in that position) in the first place. He isn’t afraid of criminal charges, he didn’t actually do anything, and he’s a minor so his identity wouldn’t be made public (he doesn’t want to think about the school’s reaction if it was), but he’d still have to admit to the police and his family that he was looking for an easy way out.

He thinks of how his father would react once he was done trying to kill Sandy. Kurt imagines pain and sorrow, but mostly disappointment. He doesn’t want that right now. The best case scenario would be Burt getting over the let-down after a few more painful years of emotional distance. In the worst case, Burt would decide Kurt was too unhappy with the situation and break things off with Carole for his son’s sake – it would kill him to do it, though, and Kurt knows they would never repair the rift. Kurt sits on the edge of his bed and thinks carefully.

Then he takes a shower and scrubs himself raw.

 

A week passes with surprising normalcy. Kurt is limping for the first day back, but he makes up a story about tripping on the way in and there’s no Glee so he doesn’t have to worry about dancing. He changes quickly for gym and Cheerios practice, before anyone can see his bruises, but even if anyone does, they assume it’s from some jock shoving him. Nothing bothers him, and though he pretends indignation when slushied and imitates excitement for Glee and Cheerios, he’s pretty sure he’s become empty inside, mechanical. It feels exactly like to what he was looking for in the first place.

A few days later, Rachel gets a duet with Finn that Kurt would have loved. He just shrugs philosophically when Mercedes points it out. “Like that’s anything new,” he comments with withering scorn directed at Mr. Schue when she continues to stare at him doubtfully. She lets it slide, but eyes him through rehearsal and Kurt makes sure to keep up his usual commentary on everything from then on.

He sits through another “family dinner” with his father, Carole, and Finn, and just smiles, nods, and throws in comments when it seems appropriate. Burt looks at him in relief and growing gratitude every time he lets something slide rather than clinging to an awkward topic. Finn looks far less uncomfortable around him than usual and Kurt stays put, never once straying into the other boy’s personal space (Kurt laughs at every bad joke Finn makes and feels too dirty to touch the boy he idolized). When the evening is over, Burt hugs his son fiercely and gruffly whispers, “Thank you.” Even though he has to fight to not freak out at the sudden contact, Kurt decides that he made the right choice.

As more days pass, though, Kurt notices that the hollow feeling is beginning to wear off. Minor misfortunes are beginning to bother him again. When Finn smiles at him in the hallway, he feels something fluttery inside for the first time since he stood under the bleachers. Kurt waves at Finn reflexively and comes to another decision.

That evening, he rings Sandy Ryerson’s doorbell. It takes two tries, as his hands are trembling uncontrollably, and then he takes a step back and contemplates running away. Before he can make up his mind, the door swings open to reveal the house’s owner. Kurt feels his muscles seize up in remembered terror. “I-“ he begins faintly, stops. He takes a quick breath and starts again with transparent bravado, looking his living nightmare in the eye. “I forgot my hat and scarf."


	2. Chapter 2

Kurt lets Sandy drug him that time, taking the glass as if he doesn’t know what’s in it and drinking it down before he can have second thoughts. He limps down to his room many hours later, but he told his dad earlier that he was doing an extra workout for Cheerios so there are no questions. He showers for as long as it takes to get off the smell of lavender.

Two visits after that, he refuses the drink. Sandy raises an eyebrow dubiously but takes both glasses away into the kitchen. Kurt sits ashen-faced on the couch, listening to the cups clinking as they’re put away and feeling his stomach twist viciously. When Sandy returns, arms akimbo and still wearing that awful robe, he just stands there and stares thoughtfully at Kurt. He can’t help the rush of fear that always comes when they share a room, but Kurt does his best to meet Mr. Ryerson’s eyes. After a moment, Sandy takes his arm and leads him firmly into the bedroom, sitting on the edge of the bed and pointing to the floor at his feet with a little authoritarian “Hm!” Kurt thinks about leaving, just turning around and walking out the door into the cold night air, but remembers the ugly stab of jealousy he felt an hour earlier when he saw his dad heading out for dinner with Carole, both adults laughing happily and gazing into eachother’s eyes. He shakily lowers himself to his knees. Kurt closes his eyes, takes a breath, parts the silk robe, and rests his hands on pasty thighs to brace himself until he’s cut off by an interjection of, “No, no, not like that!”

Sandy abruptly grabs his hands and places them instead on the small triangle of mattress between his spread legs (Kurt thinks that he looks like he’s imitating squirrel paws and briefly, hysterically wonders if Mr. Ryerson has a fetish for woodland creatures). Then a hand is threaded through his hair and another is under his chin, ruthlessly controlling him so that he has to look up into Sandy’s glare as he scolds, “And don’t make faces!” The hands hold him there as he screws up his face, struggling to hide his fear and locking back the urge to cry. The hundreds of glass eyes stare down at him, though, and he knows what Sandy wants, so as the seconds tick by, he slowly schools his face into impassivity. Sandy nods, pleased, and Kurt keeps his expression bland and empty even as the hand in his hair finally urges him forward and he begins to bob his head up and down, wet blue eyes staring at nothing.

That time, when he leaves, Mr. Ryerson matter-of-factly informs him, “You can’t come next Tuesday. I have a meeting with the organizers of the stray cat rescue network until seven, and believe me, it will take all evening to get the dander washed out of my clothes after. Not to mention the emotional recovery, if you know what I mean, you haven’t seen ‘catty’ until you’ve met these…” Sandy complains for a little longer and Kurt stands in the doorway and nods with a blank expression and throws up when he gets home.

He comes back on Wednesday.

 

Life goes on. Kurt goes to school and does as well as he ever does, although now the doodles on his notes are abstract and no longer feature hearts around the initials “FH.” He makes sure to be as entertainingly bitchy as possible during lunch to keep the handful of glee members who eat together happy. He breaks extended primping sessions into a series of shorter ones so that he’s never holding still for long when he looks at himself in a mirror (he has no desire to know what he looks like doll-faced) and Mercedes complains about him ducking into bathrooms more frequently and throwing off their joint primping schedule. Kurt makes up a reasonable excuse and does her nails once a week as an apology, upon which she seems mollified. Finn probably has the most opportunity to notice his rare slip-ups, as their parents encourage them to share rides to school now, but he isn’t very observant and Kurt takes care to keep physical and emotional distance between them (Finn doesn’t deserve to be tainted by him).

Glee continues to go well. The whole group is really pulling together, even with some of the members not talking to each other over the drama of the week (Rachel, while inevitably involved, always continues talking to/at everyone anyway). Kurt throws himself into the numbers, faking dazzling grins and hitting every note pitch-perfect to compensate for his dancing being a bit stiff once or twice a week. He doesn’t try out for solos anymore, even when his friends physically push him towards the front of the room.

After he turns down the chance to sing “Role of a Lifetime” from the musical Bare, though, Mercedes finally snaps.

“Kurt, what is wrong with you?” She corners him after Glee despite his attempts at deflecting her and makes him stay in his chair so he can’t use his height advantage against her. He still does his best to look down his nose at her. “You’ve been ranting about that musical since I’ve known you, and now you’re turning down the only chance you’ll get to perform something from it?” She glares at him and taps a converse-clad foot against the tile floor. “Something’s up. Spill.”

Kurt is thankful that everyone else has left the room, anticipating a screaming match between the partners in crime.

He gives a long-suffering sigh and brings up a hand so he can examine his nail beds. “Nothing’s wrong, Mercedes,” he explains patiently. “It’s like I said in practice, I think it would work better in someone else’s range. Besides,” he tacks on, a devious smirk blossoming on his lips for effect, “don’t you think a rendition by Puck would be mind-blowing?” He goes so far as to waggle his eyebrows jokingly.

Mercedes clearly isn’t buying it. She doesn’t even smile at the suggestion about Puck, and Kurt realizes that she’s completely serious. “Bullshit. It’s exactly right for your voice, and you wouldn’t give up a solo from that show for anyone. You’ve been doing it for weeks,” she insisted, taking a purposeful step further into Kurt’s space. “Your dancing is off, too, and you’re acting funny lately.” Kurt’s ready to bolt, but that would mean making his best friend even more suspicious, and he doesn’t want to hurt her (again). Her gaze softens as she leans in so they’re eye-to-eye. “You know you can tell me anything, right?”

For a wild second, Kurt imagines telling her, ‘I was drugged and raped, and I’ve been going back to the man who did it once, often twice a week so he can do it again. I was at his house Friday right after you and I went shopping together. Congratulations, your best friend is no longer a virgin.’ The possibility flashes through his mind but is gone as quickly as it came. He’s already seen what Mercedes looks like when someone breaks her heart.

Instead, he smiles gently at her, his best friend, his rock. “I know, Mercedes,” he says softly, grasping one of her hands and squeezing it reverentially. “Thank you.”

She squeezes back tightly and searches his face closely for any hint that he’s hiding something. Kurt has gotten very good at hiding things, though. It’s become even easier now that he’s stopped caring about most things (but not Mercedes- never Mercedes). She sighs and straightens up, using their linked hands to haul him to his feet. He hesitates for a moment, then hugs her tightly, awkwardly. Mercedes wraps her arms around him automatically, shocked but incredibly touched at the gesture. She’s shorter than him and comfortingly soft, and the reflexive shudder that comes now when teen boys and grown men grab him never starts, so he doesn’t let go until she does.

 

For some reason, letting Sandy dress him up for hours on end (the cooing alone makes him want to throw things, but he stares at nothing and looks blank instead) makes him feel even dirtier than allowing him to fuck him once Sandy has found a costume he really likes.

This time, Mr. Ryerson settles on a fringed flapper dress (Kurt thinks he recognizes it from the school’s failed production of Cabaret) and sits down a spindly chair in the bedroom, depositing a small bag on the floor next to him. He gestures imperiously and Kurt obediently pads over and sits straddling his lap, giving no sign that shame is withering his insides. When the bag is revealed to be a makeup kit and Sandy begins to delicately paint his face in Madame-Alexander-as-Roxie-Hart style (god, he wishes there wasn’t a mirror in his line of sight, he can face almost anything but his own reflection as cosmetics warp it out of recognition), he wishes it was possible to disappear, especially when Mr. Ryerson begin to stir and harden under him. Glass eyes look down at him as he becomes a stranger to himself and the lipstick brush painting his lips feels like he imagines kisses might.

 

Kurt is having breakfast with his father when Burt awkwardly clears his throat and sends him a searching look over his coffee mug. “You didn’t look so hot when you came in from your run last night. You sure everything went okay?”

Kurt has to chuckle at that. His dad must have been trying to think of a way to bring that up for the past twenty minutes. “Everything’s fine, dad,” he assures him with a fond smile. It had taken him a little while to get himself together after returning home (Mr. Ryerson had made Kurt prepare himself that time under his pale gaze, and it felt like a uniquely shameful new level of complicity) but he’d been perfectly numb since waking up.

Burt still looks doubtful. “It was a long run and you said you went through the park,” he points out gruffly. “That’s where all the druggie kids hang out, from what I hear. And you’ve been a little zoned out some days…”

Kurt’s eyes nearly bulge out of his head. This was not where he expected that intro to lead. “Dad, please tell me you’re not going where I think you’re going with this line of inquiry,” he moans, bringing up a hand to rub his temples. It’s far too early for this.

Burt just squares his shoulders and continues, giving him a penetrating look. Kurt knows he’s worried, but this is not a conversation he wants to be having. “I just want you to be honest,” Burt says. “Are you on anything?”

He can tell that his father is trying to look supportive, yet stern, but it comes off as more confused than anything. Kurt rolls his eyes (and yes, he thinks with sick humor, he was on something last night, when he’d ridden Mr. Ryerson until the man came, stroking the skin on Kurt’s trembling thighs and praising him for being such a good little doll and making no noise at all). “No, I’m not.” Kurt wishes that drugs were the extent of his problems right now, that he really had just gotten addicted to some powder or pill like he originally intended. “I have no desire to mess up my body with strange chemicals, you know that,” he cheerfully taps the box of organic cereal for emphasis. “Tell you what,” he smirks playfully, hoping to deflect the discussion away from the ‘run’ and towards Burt’s fear of his son becoming a junkie, “as soon as I do begin experimenting with substance abuse, you’ll be the first to know.” He goes back to his cereal and Burt looks like he wants to argue (Hummel stubbornness can extend debates over a period of weeks) until Kurt reminds him that he left this discussion to the last second and now he has fifteen minutes to get to work on time. Burt scowls and gulps down the remainder of his coffee.

 

Kurt finds out early on that Mr. Ryerson doesn’t like to push at his ability to hold onto his mask and he generally doesn’t bring up things he thinks will affect Kurt in his occasional rambling monologues. So Kurt is put on edge when he hears the name “Noah Puckerman” carelessly fall from Sandy's lips. It’s just part of a reminiscence about Sandy’s Acafellas days, by way of another William Schuester rant, but Kurt watches his face fearfully for any hint of intent. There is a tiny spark of lust in his eyes, and for once it’s not directed at the half-naked body perched on his lap. Dread washes through Kurt and sends him into overdrive (even through his terror, he thanks god the name wasn’t “Finn Hudson”).

He crushes the ever-present fear down as much as possible and gives the performance of his life. Kurt forces himself to be perfect that night: noiseless, utterly passive, blue eyes wide and unblinking as Sandy caresses his skin and uses him as he wants. He doesn’t once shudder in revulsion. It’s a Friday night, so he slips out to call his father (he pretends that this conversation isn’t happening with him standing in the nude in the living room of a man banned from contact with teenagers, come crusting on his thighs and heart beating out of his chest) and, when annoyance flashes in Sandy’s eyes over Kurt’s momentary absence, he slides onto the bed beside him and demurely (he reminds himself to fight the gag reflex) informs him that he can stay the night, if Mr. Ryerson wishes.

Sometime around midnight, when he is laying in bed with Sandy Ryerson’s arms wrapped around him, dressed in Sandy’s hideous idea of pajamas and fighting the urge to vomit or cry or hit something as his tormentor nuzzles his neck in his sleep, he thinks that this had fucking better be enough to keep Mr. Ryerson’s interest from falling on anyone else.


	3. Chapter 3

The next week at school, Kurt tries very hard not to think about Friday night or how Saturday morning was worse – largely due to having to come home and face his father with a good story to back up his earlier lie. Facing himself had been almost worst of all, though. He’s noticed that the empty feeling that comes after visits to Mr. Ryerson is lasting shorter and shorter times after each visit, and he has to make more frequent ‘house calls’ to compensate. Sometimes he’s still aching between his legs from the last time when he shows up on Sandy’s porch. And on Friday night he was willing to do more than he’d ever done before to shield someone else (and he’s sickeningly sure that he’ll do it again and again if he has to, he wants no more pain on his conscience). A half-formed thought, ‘I want out’ begins to tug at his mind.

Thankfully, there is plenty of light-hearted drama at school to distract people from his own lack of focus. It seems that Puck has decided to expand his repertoire of insults, as he tries new ones out on the glee club all day Monday (Kurt has to assume it’s partially affectionate, though, because even Quinn gets one, uncreative as “Juno” is). It doesn’t matter to Kurt, as he does his level best to stay away from Puck on the best of days, and this may actually be the worst of days after Friday night. He manages to avoid interacting with the delinquent completely until midway through Glee, when Puck wants his attention and shouts, “Hey, uh, Hummel doll!” above the chatter in the practice room.

For some reason, those words from this person (“…that nice young Noah Puckerman,” he remembers hearing as a hand strokes his back absently, “now there’s a boy who can fill out a tuxedo!”) in this setting (the glee practice room, the place Mr. Ryerson was expelled from months ago, where he should be safe – except that now he knows Mr. Ryerson used to watch him here, maybe still does) trigger something uncontrollable. The air becomes thin in Kurt’s lungs and it feels like an iron band is tightening around his chest. His eyes squeeze shut and he gasps for breath, wrapping his arms around himself tightly. Sheet music flutters unheeded from his hands. All he can feel is weight above him, crushing him, choking him, the smell of lavender.

“Shit,” someone says, and there are bodies all around him, he can feel them crowding in, but he can’t open his eyes (he doesn’t want to see anything right now, if he looks, it’ll be Mr. Ryerson come to find him).

“Puck!” a girl’s sharp voice chides, and Kurt is sucking in panicked breaths, not enough air getting to his lungs, so he sort of hears the response of, “What, I didn’t do anything this time! I called his name, why the fuck’s he freaking out? Hummel, man, snap out of it!”

The argument continues – “You must have done something, he wasn’t having a panic attack before!” – but Kurt doesn’t pay it attention, as he’s too busy backing up until his back hits a wall, getting as much distance as possible between himself and the murmuring crowd he senses ahead of him, the one person he still feels all over him.

“Kurt,” he hears from many voices, pitches and intonations varying. (“Oh, Kurt,” he hears in his head as he feels a phantom hand stoke his hair). He whimpers and clutches himself tighter. Footsteps come closer and he’s not so out of touch with reality yet that he doesn’t recognize Mercedes’ approach. His breath evens out a little and he’s about to open his eyes slightly when he catches a stray shout from the argument at the side of the room – “A Hummel doll! They’re those little porcelain German doll things-“ and Kurt closes his eyes again, crumpling and sliding down the wall to the floor.

There’s a long tense silence – bar the sound of a slap and Puck’s baffled “ow!” – in which he feels a soft, feminine hand on his shoulder. He smells Mercedes’ perfume (he helped her pick it out, way back when she thought they were dating) and relaxes a fraction, though he can’t stop his hands from trembling.

“Come on, Kurt,” her honey-smooth voice murmurs from next to him, “I’m taking you home.”

He lets her lift him to his feet and hold his hand, gently pulling him out of the room. He still feels light-headed and either he hasn’t stopped shaking or there’s a very small earthquake going on, because keeping his balance is a minor challenge as he puts one foot carefully in front of the other. He doesn’t look at anyone, not wanting to know what expression (shock, disgust, pity) they might be wearing, but as he passes Puck near the door, he does lift his gaze a little. He has to know that he did well enough Friday night to keep the idiot safe, that Mr. Ryerson didn’t pay him a visit anyway between when Kurt left Saturday morning and when he first saw Puck in the hallway today.

Puck looks as solid and unharmed (if unrepentantly sociopathic) as ever, so Kurt satisfies himself with one searching glance over Puck's bewildered (panicked?) features before turning his gaze back to the floor so that he can keep an eye on it as it continues to tremble beneath him. Mercedes sends Puck a warning look that Kurt can’t see and tugs her best friend out of the room, wrapping an arm around him once they’re in the hallway.

 

Mercedes doesn’t try to make him talk about it once they get back to his room, but the probing looks are enough to let him know she’s not dropping it yet. Still, she puts in a DVD of “Some Like it Hot” for him, and keeps her arm draped around his shoulders until he stops shaking completely, and by the time Osgood Fielding III says “Well, no one’s perfect,” Kurt’s pulled himself together enough to pretend the entire humiliating episode didn’t happen. They gossip lightly about the latest drama involving Jesse’s suspect sexuality and complain about how Cheerios uniforms don’t accessorize with anything – although Mercedes maintains that one can rock fabulous hoop earrings while wearing one, Kurt points out that hoops totally undermine the clean geometric lines of the outfit. They bicker and lightly mock the freshman fashion disasters walking McKinley’s halls, and Mercedes invites herself to stay for a sleepover. She doesn’t say anything about Kurt’s breakdown until they’re laying in bed (although he has a second of internal panic, he finds that he can still handle sharing a bed with Mercedes; she stays on her side of the bed and her presence is both comforting and totally antithetical to Mr. Ryerson’s).

“Kurt?” she whispers. His room is practically soundproof, but neither of them likes to raise their voices once the lights have been flicked off – Kurt kind of suspects they’re making up for years of whispered late-night conversations at sleepovers they were never invited to.

“Yeah?” he responds drowsily. He could try to fake sleep, but he knows Mercedes, and if she really wants an answer she’ll kick him awake.

“What happened today? Don’t try to say ‘nothing,’ I know you, and it takes a lot to get you upset.”

Kurt stares at the ceiling in the dark and thinks. Mercedes' concern is a double-edged blade. It’s intended to take out anyone who would damage her friends, but it’s going to wound Mercedes herself if she finds out how deep the damage goes in this case – how deep he’s let it go.

“There were some – bullies, a while back,” he lies, hastening to add, “a very, very long while back.” Mercedes makes a little doubtful noise, but he brushes a hand over his bangs nervously and she lets him finish. “Nothing overly traumatic happened, but it got out of hand and I got scared. I haven’t thought about it in years, but I guess Puck’s ‘Hummel doll’ comment brought it back.” He manages to spit the words out without sounding as revolted by them as he really is. “I’m really sorry I worried you like that, Mercedes,” he says sincerely, reaching over in the dark to grab her hand – there’s an awkward moment when his hand grazes her breast and they both laugh nervously – “I’m okay now, though. Seriously.”

He can feel her gaze upon him, heavy in the dark, and he feels the moment when she accepts the explanation (for now). “So long as that’s all it is,” she says, squeezing his hand. “But you know I’ll do anything I can to keep my boy from hurting, right?”

Kurt nods and he knows he would feel tears pricking his eyes if he hadn’t stopped crying around the one hour, fifty minute mark that first time in Sandy Ryerson’s house. “I know. Same goes for my best girl, okay?” He listens to her murmur of sleepy acceptance with a frozen smile.

 

Even if he’s managed to temporarily allay Mercedes’ suspicions, he has to do so again and again for the rest of New Directions as each member approaches him individually throughout the day Tuesday (even Mr. Schue, and it’s the most awkward ten minutes Kurt’s ever spent in his company, ‘Bust a Move’ included). Puck and Finn are the only two that don’t speak to him about it, Finn because Kurt put his mind at ease on the drive over that morning, Puck because Santana has (surprisingly and maybe sweetly – the jury’s still out) forbidden him from coming within ten feet of Kurt. By the end of the day, Kurt half-believes the bully story himself, and in any case, he much prefers it to the truth.

It’s a Tuesday evening, so Kurt can’t return to Mr. Ryerson’s house, even if after the turmoil of the last day, he needs to be numb more than ever, his whispered sort-of-epiphany buried under the landslide of stress (fear and loathing and a weak spark of his old pride aren’t enough to override the compulsion to seek out his personal hell). It’s just as well he doesn’t have a choice, though, because his friends have apparently taken it upon themselves to make sure he’s fine by keeping him occupied every second after school. He wouldn’t mind the attention so much if they’d stop treating him like glass (like china), but he bitches at them enough that they all eventually give up on that part.

Right after school, Quinn bats her eyes at him and guilts him into driving her to the obstetrician, where he holds her hand and stares in horror at the diagrams on the walls. She buys him ice cream as a thank-you, and he wouldn’t suspect her of being part of a plot except that Tina and Artie show up at the same ice cream shop a half hour later and drag him to the mall once they’ve dropped off Quinn. After he’s helped Artie pick out two new shirts, which he just wishes were a whole new wardrobe for his fashion-challenged friend, Finn, Matt, and Mike run into them at the food court. Finn performs the worst imitation of surprise Kurt’s ever seen. Around this time, Kurt gives up and goes with the flow, having a surprisingly good afternoon, although one time he slips up and flinches violently when Matt accidentally knocks into him (Mike notices and furrows his brow, but doesn’t say anything). He collapses into bed, exhausted, at the end of the day. Even if he dreamt anymore, he would be too worn out to do so now.

Wednesday morning, he gets into a fight with his dad over whose turn it was to wash the dinner dishes last night. It starts with mild enough accusations but soon escalates to the point where Burt raises his voice and Kurt starts making personal attacks for the first time in weeks and his father leaves without saying goodbye. The door rattles on its hinges as it slams behind him, leaving an echoing silence. Kurt glares at the door as if it were his father until the burn of anger in his gut gradually cools and is replaced by a creeping sense of guilt. He and Burt had been getting along so well again, too, he realizes, right up until Kurt had pushed too far, as usual. He breathes deeply and goes to do the dishes in the sink, annoyed with himself because he’s still mad at his father despite knowing it had been a trivial argument. That annoyance just compounds the guilt. Kurt feels like a mess. He bites his lip and decides to go back to Mr. Ryerson’s house this evening.

As soon as practice (Cheerios today, and he’s glad because people here don’t care enough about his feelings to interrogate him) is over, he changes out of his practice uniform, grabs his bag, and is on his way out the door when he’s interrupted by Mercedes. Kurt tries to protest, claiming homework, but she isn’t impressed and drags him out for a movie night He can’t argue without making her even more suspicious, so he goes along with it, although all he can think is that he needs to get out, even as Mercedes “discovers” that it’s two-for-one ticket night (she’s almost as bad at faking surprise as Finn) and pulls him into another showing. By the time they get out, it’s dark and he has to go straight home. He doesn’t remember how either movie ends.

The next day, Mike and Matt corner him after Glee and beg him to help them work on a song. He’s pretty sure they don’t need the help and he’s positive that Mercedes is behind it, but he stays because he doesn’t have a good excuse not to. He’s waspish with them and finds fault in everything, so they’re as glad as he is when Finn interrupts, poking his head in to remind him about the family dinner that evening. When the three of them have left, Finn hitching a ride with the other two, Kurt sits in the silence of the practice room and tries not to panic. It’s been nearly a week since he’s visited Sandy, and although that was normal at the beginning, he hasn’t gone this long without seeing him for probably a month. There isn’t time to go over before he’s needed at home, even though the prospect of dealing with his father, Carole, and Finn all together in his current state is horrible to contemplate. And what if Mr. Ryerson thinks he’s not coming back? Kurt is terrified that Sandy will move on to Puck, and even if Kurt doesn’t really like him, he’s determined that there won’t be any new targets. He hates that he isn’t the only one with something at stake anymore.

He feels his hands starting to shake and hurriedly moves to the piano bench so he can try to play a brief melody and soothe himself with music, his old standby. Before everything started, he could always surround himself with sound and forget his problems for at least a few minutes, but he hasn’t really tried to sit at a piano and enfold himself in music since. It doesn’t work now. Although his trembling fingers hit the proper notes in the correct rhythm, the sounds are stilted and wrong, like an episode of hysteria set to music. He slams the cover over the keys after only two bars and slumps against the instrument, confused and hurt and frustrated for reasons he can’t identify. If he doesn’t have his music, what does he have left? He can’t bring himself to leave, though, and stays huddled against the piano until the janitor kicks him out.

A little later at the only decent Italian restaurant in Lima, Kurt realizes that this is the worst “family dinner” since the disastrous first one. He barely pays attention to what anyone is saying, finding it uninteresting when he does tune in, and can’t stop fidgeting with his napkin. Burt shoots him a disappointed look when he fails to answer three direct questions in a row, and Kurt has to stomp on Finn’s foot twice when he comes close to mentioning Kurt's breakdown – only to almost be overwhelmed by the temptation to run his foot up and down Finn’s ankle instead (he can at least kill the butterflies in his stomach by remembering what he’s allowed to happen, how filthy he’s become). Carole keeps smiling, but it’s strained, if nowhere near as fake as Kurt’s.

The drive home with his father is uncomfortably silent.


	4. Chapter 4

On Friday, Kurt avoids Mercedes completely towards the end of the day. He catches her eye at one point, sees the determination there, and knows that she’ll kidnap him again if he gives her the chance. He can’t give her that chance, can’t lose the opportunity to seek Mr. Ryerson out. Kurt has felt his self-control dwindling all day, and seeing Finn and Rachel chatting together in the hallway before last period awakes a nasty jealous feeling he thought he was done with a long time ago. He sits through his last class with an eye on the clock and bolts out of the school as soon as the bell rings.

He can barely breathe as he jogs along the edge of the football field, eschewing dignity for haste for the first time he can remember. He needs to get there soon and he’s as terrified of being caught right now as he was when he was standing under the bleachers the first time – only then, if he had been spotted, he could have been saved from everything that happened after, and now he’s running right back towards it. He’s about to make the turn into the parking lot when he sees someone with their back to him next to the equipment shed and he falters to a stop. Kurt looks around nervously and approaches the figure, heart in his throat as he recognizes that mohawk.

Fear slithers its way into his gut and he jogs back, feet pounding the turf and breath coming in ragged bursts, only partly because of the exertion. Puck turns to face him and without thinking about it, Kurt grabs Puck by the sleeve of his letter jacket and yanks him around to the side of the shed facing away from Sandy Ryerson’s presumable path of approach.

“What the fuck, Hummel?” Puck barks, stumbling to a stop and looking at him as if he’s gone insane. Puck straightens his jacket with an aggressive jerk (appropriately enough, Kurt can’t help thinking).

“What are you doing out here?” Kurt hisses, chest heaving, eyes flicking rapidly around in case Sandy appears.

Puck stares at him some more and shrugs, annoyed and still a bit confused. “None of your business. Why are you here?” Kurt can’t help but notice Puck puts a few feet between them and glances nervously right and left, as if expecting Santana to jump out from somewhere and castrate him for talking to Kurt.

Kurt grits his teeth in frustration. “I’m going home,” he lies heatedly, “and you – you need to leave.” The second bit sounds more desperate than he’s comfortable with, and Puck jumps on that as an opening to torment him.

“Oh?” Puck tilts his head cockily, though he shoves his hands in his pockets and doesn’t loom into Kurt’s space like he was expecting. Puck smirks, playing it out. “And why is that?”

Kurt realizes he hadn’t planned this out at all and can’t come up with an answer that doesn’t incriminate him somehow; the last thing he wants is for Puck to be the one to bring the secrecy of the last months crashing down. The adrenaline fades. Puck’s smirk widens as he watches him struggle to find words, and Kurt just knows Puck thinks that doesn’t happen enough, but time stretches on and Puck’s expression begins to falter somewhat when he also notices that the desperation in the Kurt’s eyes has intensified every second he’s been quiet (and Kurt’s been quiet for a lot of seconds). He uncomfortably looks around for Mercedes or someone to help, clearly worried that he’s triggered another panic attack. Kurt stares at him pleadingly and bites his lip, hoping that the desperation will get the message through without words that Puck really has to get out of here.

“Hey, it’s cool,” Puck tries awkwardly, now backing away a few steps and eyeing Kurt as if he’s going to explode any second, thoughts of teasing him forgotten in light of an impending breakdown. ”I’m not gonna be out here long, I’m just gonna do my stuff and then leave. Like, right away. Okay?” He goes so far as to take his hands out of his pockets and hold them up in a placating gesture.

Kurt takes a shuddery breath, not wanting to deal with any of this, but knowing that he has to get Puck to understand, to not go anywhere with the man they’ve both come to meet. “I saw Mr. Ryerson checking out your ass,” he blurts, nearly as nonplussed by the outburst once it escapes as Puck appears to be. “During your Acafellas concert,” he continues, consoling himself that it’s at least a half-truth, he just didn’t personally see the action happen.

Puck’s face contorts in confusion, a look Kurt would have found hilarious at any other time, and opens his mouth for a second without sound before managing an incredulous, “Dude, what? Ew.” His mouth works a few more seconds before he weakly adds, “Thanks for the… warning, I guess?”

And because it’s always his first instinct to fill awkward silences and the Acafellas mention sets off a chain of associations in Kurt’s mind (so that he won’t think about Mr. Ryerson singing and dancing with Finn and Puck and Mr. Schue and Coach Tanaka before all of this started) from the group’s performance to the PTA meeting to Puck’s middle-aged lovers, he has to ask, “Why do you sleep with all those older women?”

Puck blinks, really not following the train of thought until he remembers performing with the Acafellas and checking out most of the audience. “What, my MILFs?” Kurt nods and looks at him curiously (and apprehensively, he really hopes it isn’t anything like-) “Because it’s hot,” Puck shrugs, cutting off his internal monologue. “They totally know what they’re doing by that age and, hey, sex is sex.”

Kurt’s eyes widen impossibly and Puck snorts, about to make fun of him for being a major prude when a familiar voice behind him warbles, “Noah Puckerman, as I live and breath! Oh, and…!”

Puck rolls his eyes and turns around in time to see Sandy Ryerson wiggle a wave at Kurt. He startles upon seeing that Sandy is standing a little closer than he’s cool with and jumps back a little, towards Kurt. He clearly remembers Kurt’s warning and backpedals on the previous conversation. “I mean, I was just saying, sex is sex and that’s awesome, but with, like, chicks. Not –“ he belatedly appears to remember his audience, and for once tries to not be insulting, “not that there’s anything wrong with, you know, not liking chicks or anything, but I don’t. Not like chicks.” Kurt wants to watch in horrified fascination as he babbles, but his gaze is helplessly locked on Sandy Ryerson instead, who in turn is watching Puck with an unreadable expression. Sandy glances over at Kurt once with a raised eyebrow as if guessing the reason for Puck’s rant, which is concluding, “I mean, I really, really like chicks, but just them. Not into sex with dudes. Yeah.”

“Well, that is fascinating,” Sandy says as the awkward silence draws on, Kurt unable to look away from Sandy and Puck refusing to look at anyone. He dangles a little manila envelope in the air and Puck grabs it, flushing, before shoving a wad of bills into his waiting hands.

“See you around, Hummel,” Puck says, backing past Kurt (presumably so as not to turn around and give Sandy a chance to check out his ass) and patting him awkwardly on the shoulder as he goes. Kurt is too distracted to flinch at the contact and just holds his breath as he’s left alone with Sandy.

Sandy stays where he is, not making a move to approach Kurt, just looking at him with a sour expression. “You haven’t been by to visit in ages.” His tone falls somewhere between whiny and accusatory.

Kurt clenches his hands into fists until his knuckles are as pale as his face. He’s not going to freak out in a public place, he isn’t, not when school is getting out and he can hear the distant sound of students yelling to each other as they board the busses. “I know,” he says quietly, tightly, not breaking his gaze away from the scowling Sandy, “I tried, but - things came up.”

Sandy doesn’t look mollified and just looks at him for another long second. Then he purses his lips in disapproval, gives a jerk of his head, and turns on his heel with less of a flourish than usual, walking back to his car. Kurt stays frozen where he is for a moment until he can remember how to move his legs and hurries to catch up. He lets himself into the passenger seat at Sandy’s gesture, buckles himself in, and clasps his hands together in his lap to keep them from shaking (he thinks a mouse must have died in the engine or something, the whole car smells like decay despite Mr. Ryerson’s attempt to mask it with a cloyingly sweet air freshener). Sandy keys the ignition and the car jolts out of the parking lot.

Kurt stares straight ahead during the short drive. He doesn’t know if he can say anything that would fix Mr. Ryerson’s annoyance (he’s never displeased him before, doesn’t know what the consequences might be and Kurt is terrified by the uncertainty). Sandy isn’t saying anything. Normally, he chatters on about something banal when he isn’t fucking Kurt or preparing to fuck him, and the tense silence is sending Kurt’s frazzled nerves haywire.

They pull up to the house and as soon as they’re inside, Sandy heads for the bedroom, instructing him to stay in the living room and pull down the blinds. Kurt does as he’s told, trying not to think about what the neighbors would see if they happened to look out a window right now (a pale-faced teen with shaking hands disappearing from sight over and over again in a room increasingly devoid of sunlight). The venetian blinds slither-thunk down like little guillotines and by the time he’s done, Mr. Ryerson is back and settled in the one large armchair. He’s wearing a silk robe again (the black one with the tacky yellow embroidery, one of three) and has his legs slightly shifted to the side. Kurt knows what he wants and silently crosses the room to kneel in the space left for him on the floor.

Sickeningly familiar hands land on his hair and begin stroking it, and it goes on long enough that Kurt is starting to think it won’t be any worse than usual. Then Sandy asks, sharper than his normal petulant tone, “What ‘things,’ exactly, prevented you from visiting this week? I was beginning to think you weren’t coming back at all.”

Kurt’s face and posture remain placid, but his earlier apprehension returns, thick enough to choke on. Normally, Sandy doesn’t ask him to speak, discourages it whenever possible, and he has to fight to force words out now. “People needed extra help for Glee. If I had said no, they would have started wondering.” He wants to cringe at how he sounds and is a little surprised that he can still feel shame. If his friends could hear him now, they wouldn’t recognize the weak murmur, so different from his normal rapid patter. His heart pounds wildly, waiting of the next question, but nothing comes other than the resumed stroking of his hair and he guesses it’s as close to acceptance as he can hope for, though it still doesn’t put him at ease.

Things progress from there to Sandy handing him a bottle of lotion and sitting back to watch, one more pair of eyes in a room full of glass ones, as Kurt follows the unspoken order (he feels himself slipping away as he removes each article of clothing and the scent of lavender makes him dizzy).

 

Kurt has been asking his manicurist to keep his nails longer lately. The sharp discomfort keeps his body from betraying him when he readies himself for the older man.

 

Sandy is still reclined in the bed, watching Kurt reach for his neatly folded and stacked clothes (the movement still hurts after all this time) when he mildly drawls, “Leaving so soon? Aren’t you going to stay the night?” Kurt freezes and looks at him out of the corner of his eye, a sick feeling building that is different from the nausea of Sandy using him. This isn’t supposed to happen. What he did on the Friday before was supposed to be a one-time thing, not a permanent upping of the stakes. He’s suddenly reminded of how easily things can progress, and it terrifies him.

Sandy senses the hesitation under his unmoving expression and laughs, stretching out along the bed (Kurt is still as repulsed by his naked body as ever) and sighing, “I suppose it is healthy for a pretty thing like you to have plans for a Friday night. I always say, people should use their youth while they still can.” Sandy segues into a brief digression – he regrets that youth is wasted on the young, isn’t it a pity what the delinquent youth of today get up to… Kurt isn’t fooled. He sees the twist in Sandy’s smile, knows that something is coming.

He’s right. “Like that handsome Noah Puckerman,” Sandy says airily, tucking his hands behind his head to get comfortable and looking at the doll perched above the headboard rather than at Kurt, who finds he can’t keep the dread out of his eyes anymore. “You know,” he says, “the two of you seemed very close. Oh, I know what he said, but sometimes the lady doth protest too much, if you know what I mean.” He finally looks over at Kurt, and the glint in his pale eyes makes the fact that the pain is worse this time than ever seem trivial. “Is that who you had plans with tonight?” Kurt's face is perfectly impassive as he reaches for his cell phone instead of his clothes and leaves the room to call his dad.

 

He counts five times that he wishes he were dead before he’s able to leave in the morning. The first is when he hears his father’s concerned voice over his cell and has to lie about spending the night with Tina (Tina, not Mercedes, because his dad has Mercedes’ phone number). Kurt explains away his dad’s concerns about the late notice and chides Burt to remember to eat a salad with dinner, there’s pre-packaged stuff in the fridge. His voice doesn’t crack when he says, “Yeah, Dad, I love you too.”

Later, he’s kneeling at Sandy’s feet wearing a silk kimono and willing his painted face to stillness as rough hands tangle into his hair and his lipstick gets systematically ruined. Renata Scotto’s voice soars over “Un bel di vedremo” in the background and the third moment surreally comes when he realizes that ‘M. Butterfly’ will never be his favorite play again.

 

Glee is torturous on Monday. Mercedes sits next to him and hovers, upset that she lost track of him all weekend. Puck won’t meet his eyes, but Kurt catches him shooting uneasy looks in his direction every few minutes. Mr. Schue is distracted by the ongoing war with Sue Sylvester and is especially snappish with Glee’s Cheerios, so the group gets to experience it’s first near-storm-out from someone other than Rachel – Santana this time. Aside from all the drama, Kurt spares a second to be annoyed that can feel a zit forming because he wasn’t able to perform his skin care regimen Friday night. He’s back to feeling like a detached observer of his own life, at least, except that he catches himself compulsively scrubbing his hands every time he passes a restroom because he can smell lavender on his skin no matter how many times he washes.

And he can’t sing.

(Because the fifth moment he wants to die comes when Sandy stops him just before he leaves, lays him on the floor, and mouth-fucks him so roughly that when Kurt is driving home and automatically tries to hum along to his Glee practice tape, he finds that his throat is too raw to make a sound. Kurt suddenly understands why Sandy’s lips had quirked triumphantly as he left.)

Mr. Schuester doesn’t question Kurt’s claim that he’s getting a cold, but it doesn’t matter anyway because Rachel has gone on another Broadway kick and manages to talk the girls and Finn into singing songs from Miss Saigon for the group. Kurt watches Rachel and Finn get up to sing “Sun and Moon” without any real interest; he supposes he’s glad they’re making progress together, if it makes Finn happy. He absently nods at Mercedes’ occasional comments on the song and just smiles brightly at her when she shoots him an ‘are you okay?’ look. Then Finn sits down a seat away from Kurt and all the girls join Rachel at the front and Kurt thinks over the girl’s group numbers from the show and thinks, ‘shit.’ When they start singing “The Movie in my Mind,” Kurt excuses himself after the first verse and stumbles into the nearest empty room to hyperventilate.

After that, everything’s sort of fine again until the next day when he’s walking through the halls during the lunch rush and he sees Sandy Ryerson come out of the teacher’s lounge, gesturing about something to a nervous-looking Miss Pillsbury. Kurt throws himself down a random hallway before Mr. Ryerson can see him and presses his back against a locker, shaking uncontrollably and gasping and helplessly clutching at his books, hoping that he’s only starting to hallucinate. He’s slumped on the floor and still trembling when Puck finds him ten minutes later.


	5. Chapter 5

“Shit. Hummel? Dude? You’re freaking me out here, man.” Puck’s wary voice slowly cuts through his daze and Kurt manages to lift his head, if only because he can’t believe that Noah Puckerman sounds like he’s afraid of Kurt Hummel. Maybe he really is hallucinating.

But Puck is solid and real in the now-empty hallway, peering down at him with the same ready-to-bolt expression he had by the time they parted under the bleachers. Kurt becomes aware of the fact that he’s curled into a ball on the floor with no good way to explain it away, so he forces his limbs to stop seizing up and scrambles gracelessly, laboriously to his feet. He still has to lean against the lockers for support and can’t breathe properly, but he pretends not to see that Puck looks more alarmed and uncomfortable than ever.

“What are you doing here?” he asks. He tries for haughty, but the heavy rasp and the fact that he can’t properly stand on his own rather ruin the effect.

Puck makes an annoyed face, but it looks more like a poor attempt to cover up shock (Kurt remembers that Puck hasn’t heard him talk since Friday). “Jones is on the warpath. She’s got half of Glee looking for you after you didn’t show up to lunch.”

Kurt can’t groan with his throat feeling like it’s been shredded, but he can close his eyes and let his head thunk back against the locker, and does.

“Seriously, though,” (and why is Puck still talking, Kurt’s pretty sure that other than their last incredibly awkward conversation, they haven’t said more than ten words to each other recently, nine of those insults) “what’s up? You’re acting really weird, even for you.”

Kurt opens one eye to peer at him, not interested in going into that, so he rasps, “Since when do you call her by her name? What happened to ‘Aretha?’”

Puck scowls, mercifully distracted by the question. “She hit me for it three times already.” Kurt bites his lip, knowing that Mercedes must be really worried to resort to physical violence, but somehow isn’t surprised by the grudging respect in Puck’s voice as he observes, “Girl punches like a dude.”

There’s a brief silence and Kurt sees Puck shift, about to start asking questions again, so he cuts in, “Have you seen that Mr. Ryerson’s back?”

Thankfully, Puck doesn’t notice the new tension in Kurt’s thin frame and nods awkwardly. “Yeah. Thanks again. I mean, for the heads-up. The guy’s been giving me really creepy smiles all day.”

Kurt’s lips tighten but he thinks he might see a way to make this work and seizes on it desperately. “You should probably keep away from him. Remember Hank Saunders? The guy Rachel Berry caught him groping?” He ignores the way his voice wavers, it just blends in with the way it’s a complete mess at this point, anyway. “He looks a little like you.”

“Ew.” Puck looks appropriately repulsed by the implication. “Not that I needed more reasons to avoid him, but, gross.” He seems to think about it a second longer and then shrugs. “Eh, if he tries anything, I can totally punch him out. But, seriously,” he gives Kurt a warily searching look, “if you’re so concerned about my virtue, why don’t you talk to Figgins or whatever it is non-studs do?”

“Please,” Kurt sneers, able to pull on his confident armor now that his knees feel steady again, “Principal Figgins allowed a known child-molester back on school property after someone caught him in the act, why would he kick him off again over a student’s suspicion?”

“You’re really worked up about this Ryerson thing, aren’t you?” Suddenly, Puck’s looking at him with a furrowed brow like he’s starting to connect the dots, and Kurt has to cut this off right now.

“No, I’m not,” he says, pulling out his best haughty sneer, managing to look down his nose at Puck even though they’re about the same height once he straightens up. “And you need to stop thinking I care about your virtue, Pretty Woman.” He means it as a scoff, but his damaged throat makes it come out as a growl. He decides he can work with that and lashes out with the bitterest words he can come up with, needing to drive Puck away before he really starts to pry. “No one’s cared about your virtue since you decided to whore yourself out to anyone sick enough to fuck a high school kid. And for what?” His voice is just short of feral as he hisses, “To get away from your wretched failure of a life, the fact that you’ll never get out of this place? Please.” He smiles tightly at Puck, who by now looks murderous. “I’m just being the bigger man here.”

Puck’s fists clench and unclench as if he really, really wants to punch Kurt, but he just snarls, “Keep talking, fairy, you’re just bitter you’ll never get any.”

Kurt has to fight back the urge to laugh hysterically at that. He curls his lip contemptuously instead, and is about to hurl a last retort and drive Puck away for good when a shout of “Kurt!” rings from nearby.

They both turn to see Mercedes pelting down the hallway towards them, and Puck turns away as she arrives.

“Puck, you found-“ she starts, but he cuts her off roughly.

“Whatever, Aretha. The little bitch is just having a hissy fit today. I’m not dealing with any more of his PMS.” Puck shoots one last venomous look at Kurt and stomps off to presumably set something on fire or whatever he does in his spare time.

Kurt sighs raggedly and Mercedes crowds in on him, looking him over as if for damage. He bats her away lightly. “I’m fine, Mercedes. I just had to duck in for a last-minute primping session and lost track of time.”

“Is that so?” she asks doubtfully, not backing off. “Then why do you look like LiLo right now – and I mean pre-Samantha Ronson? Something’s messing you up, and I’m going to find out what it is.”

He purses his lips in a moue of annoyance. “Seriously, Mercedes. I’m fine. Drop it.”

Mercedes glances at the direction Puck left in, as if guessing where this is likely to head, and doesn’t push it for now.

There are only ten minutes left of lunch, but Mercedes has texted everyone that Kurt is no longer AWOL, so the glee table reassembles in the lunch room until the bell rings.

Rachel is in fine form, and all the others but Kurt are rolling their eyes as she rants (apparently she’s been on it all morning) about Mr. Ryerson’s reinstatement. “I’m just trying to emphasize that it’s incredibly irresponsible of Principal Figgins to put his students in danger this way, when their emotional and physical well-being should be his highest priority, even above academics! Yes, perhaps it’s in the interest of the budget to bring in someone willing to work for half-pay, but even that brings up ethical issues that I, for one, am surprised the teacher’s union haven’t brought up already. It’s not just ethics, either; my two gay dads have already started to worry about what his reinstatement might do to the public perception of gays in this town…”

Kurt ignores her and sips at a bottle of flavored water, staring out at the crowd of students to distract himself from Rachel’s rant. He can’t help but think that if she had seen him talking to Mr. Ryerson all those weeks ago, she would have called 911 without a second thought (and he doesn’t know if he hates her or himself more for the fact that he sort of wishes she had). But now the lunch bell is about to ring and Mercedes is still giving him the side-eye, so he does his best to let Rachel’s words wash over him without the meaning sinking in. He can’t afford to react now.

Puck has been thankfully absent since he stormed off in the hallway, but as the bell rings and Kurt escapes the table with Mercedes practically glued to his side, he sees Puck lurking in the crowd streaming through the door. Kurt clenches his jaw. Puck is probably still angry and won’t be making any attempts to talk to him soon, but Kurt is absolutely certain that Mercedes will corner him at the first opportunity. And now Kurt knows that Puck is intimidated by Mercedes (on any other day, that knowledge would have sent him into paroxysms of joy), which makes the situation a thousand times worse. If Mercedes interrogates Puck, he’ll spill everything, and he already has all the pieces. And although Puck may not have put them together yet, Mercedes will.

They’re nearing the door and Kurt can feel the moment Mercedes locks eyes on Puck, her features settling into narrow-eyed determination. Kurt nervously straightens his cuffs and his gaze flicks around the other students desperately. Just as Mercedes begins to change her course, Kurt takes a deep breath and pretends to give a meat-headed jock a very obvious once-over.

Mercedes has to take him to the bathroom to wash slushie out of his hair instead.

 

That night, he’s sitting exhausted at the dinner table with his father – just the two of them, Burt had said something about missing Kurt’s cooking. Kurt isn’t sure that’s true, he knows for a fact that Carole is a better cook than he is and Burt takes over dinner almost as often as he does, anyway. It still makes his lips quirk in an involuntary smile.

“This is really good,” Burt observes around a mouthful of hamburger.

Kurt smiles and shakes his head. “That might be because I actually measure the ingredients when I cook, unlike certain people I know.” Though neither Burt nor Kurt acknowledge it, tonight Kurt just put together everything he could think of that his father likes. It means that he’ll have to go for a jog tomorrow, as what Burt likes is inevitably loaded with carbs and saturated fat, but he figures it’s worth it.

With the two Hummels, dinner tends to be a quiet affair unless Kurt has found a new interest to gush about, but while he used to find the long silences uncomfortable, tonight Kurt catches himself wishing it could go on forever. Right now his father is with him, not off somewhere with Finn or on a date with Carole, and he savors the moment as much as he can after his long and trying day (coming up with subtle ways to keep Mercedes and Puck away from each other was exhausting, but not nearly so much as ignoring the fact that Mr. Ryerson was in the building somewhere).

“Haven’t seen much of you lately,” Burt says after he’s finished half his burger.

Kurt shrugs and makes himself meet his father’s eyes. His dad always knows when he’s being evasive. “I’ve been busy.”

“I guess.”

There’s another silence where Burt just watches him, brows furrowing under the baseball cap he refuses to take off at the table, no matter how much Kurt’s nagged him in the past.

“I could use some help in the shop,” Burt says gruffly. Kurt knows he isn’t imagining the undercurrent of tentative hope under his father’s voice and leans forward in cautious interest, an elbow on the table, chin propped up on his hand. “Wanna come in the next couple days after practice?”

Kurt wants to. He wants to spend time with his dad more than anything, and no hollow dead feeling or fear or jealousy over Finn is enough to totally quell that familiar desperate urge. Even the threat of engine grease under his nails for the next week isn’t enough to make one-on-one time with his father any less appealing. He knows that Mr. Ryerson will be expecting him at some point, but the fear of displeasing the man again, while strong enough to incapacitate him when he stops to think about it, is hard to remember when his dad is looking right at him asking to spend guy-bonding time together for the first time in what feels like years, so he just smiles through his tiredness (this time it’s not forced) and honestly says, “I’d love to."


	6. Chapter 6

Getting up the next morning takes longer than usual. Kurt can’t quite remember why he needs to get up and go to school today, except maybe to keep everyone from worrying (or figuring it out). He eventually gets himself out of bed by telling himself that it’s unlikely that he’ll run into Sandy Ryerson during the day, and that so long as it’s a brief hallway encounter and he’s ready for it, he won’t turn into a quivering mess again or automatically go blank-eyed and placid right there in the halls of McKinley High School (but he knows he won’t be ready for it, he never is).

He dresses extra-fabulously, and his new sheer sweater is enough to distract Mercedes from asking too much about the previous day, at least for the first few periods.

Kurt tenses a little every time he leaves a classroom and only relaxes when the next class starts. He doesn’t feel totally safe even then, but he sort of thinks that Sandy wouldn’t do anything too obvious, like pulling him out of class. Even though he feels himself wearing thin from the effort, he’s sure he’s still doing an awful job of hiding his nervousness because whenever he shares a class with Mercedes, she keeps looking over at him with frustration and raised eyebrows and pursed lips. He gives her a blank confused look and a shrug each time and makes sure they’re never alone together between periods, even though the hurt look on her face when she realizes he’s avoiding her kills him a little.

He’s walking with Artie between Chemistry and English when someone behind him clears their throat. The small sound goes straight to his muscle memory and freezes him in place. Artie rolls ahead for a few feet before realizing that Kurt is no longer with him and when Artie looks back, he gives a brittle smile, waves a ‘shoo-‘ing hand at him, and reassuringly calls, “I’ll catch up with you in a few minutes.” Artie frowns, but sees the reinstated Mr. Ryerson standing behind Kurt with a scowl on his face and arms akimbo, and reluctantly continues on to class. Artie throws one thoughtful glance over his shoulder as he goes, but in a few seconds he has turned the corner and is out of sight.

Kurt turns to face Sandy, exercising every bit of control he has to not start shaking (it doesn’t work).

“Come see me in my office,” Mr. Ryerson says officiously and starts off down a side hallway. Kurt follows automatically. Sandy opens the door to an office, so new that the nameplate is just a piece of typed paper taped where the plaque should be. Kurt enters the room and wordlessly sits at the chair facing Sandy’s desk, a sick shiver running through him as the door clicks shut and Sandy flips the lock. Kurt continues to stare straight ahead (steadily, glassily) as Mr. Ryerson enters his vision and seats himself at the desk chair, leaning forward and peering at him with an overdone benevolent expression.

“I won’t keep you from your English class long, Annie Tindle did say you were struggling with your ‘Catcher in the Rye’ assignment.” Kurt wants to bolt for the door or curl into a ball or scream but finds himself just nodding passively, which seems to please Sandy. He grabs a small pad of paper and scribbles on the top sheet as he cheerfully continues, “I thought it would be rude not to say ‘hello’ when I had the chance, though.” He pauses and sighs in mock-exasperation. “I was so busy getting settled into my new sanctum these past two days, though, I just couldn’t find the time. Don’t worry, now that everything’s nice and cozy, I have plenty of spare time once again.” Sandy tears off the top sheet of paper and pushes it across the desk, then repeats the process for the next one.

Kurt looks away from Sandy long enough to glance down at the hall passes. The first has the current time on it. The second…

“You have seventh period with William Schuester, right?” Sandy asks, not waiting for a confirmation before continuing with a little dismissive flick of his hand, “He won’t miss you for half a period today. Now, shoo, get yourself to class before Mrs. Tindle gets too far in the lesson.”

Kurt obediently folds the hall passes into neat squares and slips them into his bag. He imagines that he feels pale eyes on his back all the way to class.

He considers skipping lunch that day, but he doesn’t want Mercedes to send out search parties again so he goes and pretends that he’s able to eat and not just pushing food around on his tray. He makes sure to control the conversation so that everyone is complaining about their schoolwork or Glee or their lack of love lives, so Artie doesn’t get the chance to ask what Mr. Ryerson wanted with him and Mercedes doesn’t get to ask what’s been bothering him, though she clearly wants to. He bitches with them and laughs and forces a smile until his face hurts.

As seventh period begins and Kurt walks down to Sandy’s office, he tries to think of the afternoon ahead. Cheerios practice will be okay (unless Sandy uses him too roughly again, he doesn’t know what to expect) and working in his dad’s shop is something he can actually look forward to. He runs through everything that will need to be done there, drifting in his own mind as his feet take him through emptying hallways. The break area will be a mess as always, he thinks. He’ll need to straighten it up, and then his dad will probably ask for help on a few of the simpler car problems. If he’s lucky, they’ll work on the same car for a while and chat easily – words always seem to come easier between them when they’re both elbow-deep in an engine. Sometimes when he finds a problem that his dad missed, or his smaller, nimble fingers allow him to reach in and fix a part his father can’t, Burt’s rugged face splits into a proud smile and Kurt feels like the son his dad wanted.

Some of the fear has dissipated with thoughts of his father when he arrives at the door to Sandy’s office, but his hand is still stiff as he raises it to knock on the wood. A muffled “Come in!” from inside, and tries to remember to keep breathing as he opens the door and lets himself in.

Mr. Ryerson is sitting behind the desk and casually flipping through a book, but gestures lazily at him once he sees who it is. Kurt closes the door and locks it, then hesitates, unsure of what to do. The setting is different now and there are no patterns to fall into, so he just stands impassively by the door as Sandy closes his book and drops it in a drawer. He fusses with the stack of paper on his desk, straightening the corners before frowning and nudging the whole thing to the far opposite side of the desk. Kurt focuses on the loud ticking of the clock on the wall and pretends he’s not there. Then Sandy finally pushes his chair back away from the desk and looks expectantly at Kurt, and he knows what’s expected of him again (the worst part might be that he’s almost relieved).

Kurt dutifully pads around the desk and sinks to his knees in front of Sandy, reaching for his zipper with trembling fingers. Sandy leans back in his chair and runs his fingertips over Kurt’s blank features as Kurt takes him out and then leans forward to take him in.

Kurt tries not to think about where he is right now, about the fact that even though Mr. Ryerson closed the blinds, there’s a small window in the door that someone could see through if they looked from the right angle. Not many people are in the halls now that class has started, but there are always students loitering around or janitors cleaning up slushies or teachers coming by to ask questions. Fear of being discovered like this (humiliated, on his knees, no sign of coercion to keep people from assuming – but what does it matter, it’s his own fault anyway) leaves him cold with dread.

There’s a hand in his hair and he allows himself to be directed, eyes unfocused, not reacting even when it hurts his still-sore throat. He tenses and stops, though, when he hears footsteps approaching the door, freezing despite the hand’s light urging. After a heart-stopping moment when the footsteps pause, seemingly right outside (if someone saw, he wonders if it would end or get worse), they recede again and Kurt chances a glance up. Mr. Ryerson is frowning at him, brows drawn together and eyes dark with irritation. Kurt passively gives in to the hand’s urging again and resumes the rhythm, although now it’s rougher, more angry, and he has to fight harder to not choke or flinch away from the pain.

When it’s over and he pulls away, a hand gently stroking his hair signals him to stay at the Sandy's feet, so he obeys and gazes blankly up at him. Hundreds of seconds pass like that (he can’t see the clock, but he can hear it ticking away). Eventually, Sandy sighs and stretches leisurely, and after a satisfied little yawn, says, “I think tonight would be a good night for a visit, if you don’t have anything planned.” Despite the accommodating words, his tone carries a note of finality.

Kurt feels cold. “I have Cheerios practice,” he says softly, expressionlessly. His throat is sore again.

Sandy looks fondly annoyed. “Oh, doll, I know that. You can drop by afterwards.”

“I can’t.”

Sandy stares at him disbelievingly. Kurt feels himself starting to tremble, though his face remains blank.

“I have to help in my dad’s shop,” Kurt manages to whisper. This is the one thing he can cling to at the moment, the one thing to make him feel any warmth in weeks, but Mr. Ryerson looks irritated and he suddenly can’t breathe.

Sandy presses his lips together. “Is that so,” he drawls, looking at Kurt through narrowed eyes. He continues to just look at him for long seconds, and Kurt fights the instinct to retract it, to do whatever Mr. Ryerson wants, because this is about his dad and he can’t back down on that.

Then Sandy heaves a heavy regretful sigh. “I suppose you must do what you must, family obligations are so important.” His gaze turns sharp. “Friday night, then. I’m sure we can make it through the week somehow.” His hand moves to caress Kurt’s cheek tenderly, and Sandy brightens up, smiles with frightening cheeriness, as if a wonderful idea has just occurred to him. “Oh, Friday! That’s the day your friend usually wants to meet with me, isn’t it? I don’t suppose that schedule will change just because I teach his English class now.” Kurt is sure all the blood has left his face and can suddenly hear a rushing in his ears, but it doesn’t block out the cloyingly sweet voice that keeps going on, “He does seem like a creature of habit for all his hell-raising, after all. Maybe we could persuade him to drop by after.” Sandy tilts his head to the side and gives Kurt a considering look. Kurt wants to throw up. “I wonder, do you think he would-“

“No,” Kurt interrupts in a hoarse, desperate whisper. He doesn’t want to hear any more of Sandy’s thoughts, doesn’t want to know the details of what he is clearly visualizing. “I’ll come. Tonight.”

Sandy raises his eyebrows as if in pleasant surprise, then smiles and pats Kurt’s cheek approvingly. Kurt hates that he’s handed him this weapon.

 

He hands the hall pass to Mr. Schuester with twenty minutes left of class, then takes a seat at the back of the room, as far away from any of his friends as he can manage. Neither Mercedes nor Puck is in the class, and he tries to count that as a blessing.

The next few hours pass in a blur. One minute, he’s being creatively yelled at by Coach Sylvester for not cheering loud enough (his throat is raw again and he has to claim another cold – Mercedes gives him a hard look from across the gym), the next he’s changing out of his uniform and hurriedly walking out the door without even stopping to fix his hair. He’s glad he didn’t stall, because by the time Mercedes shows up at the door of the boys’ locker room, he’s just far enough away to pretend not to hear her calling after him.

Sandy’s car is waiting outside the entrance to the school and he slides in numbly. Sandy stops tapping his fingers against the wheel and reaches over to smooth down an unruly patch in Kurt’s hair. Kurt goes still and allows Mr. Ryerson’s hand to linger for a nauseating second. Then he smiles at him and starts the car and chatters airily the whole way to his house. Kurt stares passively ahead through an anecdote about Principal Figgins and Ken Tanaka’s reaction to an involuntary pay cut, and then a short rant about Mr. Schuester’s lack of talent, but they soon arrive at Sandy’s home and he follows him in without protest.

This time, Sandy pulls him directly into the bedroom after Kurt mutely shakes his head ‘no’ to the offer of an after-school snack (“Ugh, don’t tell me you’re watching your figure, dollface, you’ve already got a body people would kill for”). Kurt docilely follows each wordless order, not wanting to anger Sandy more than he already has today, and it seems to work (when Mr. Ryerson doesn’t make him prepare himself, he wants to curl into a ball and die because it feels like a reward).

Soon there’s the familiar pain and stomach-turning scent of lavender. Kurt remains still and doesn’t think about the fact that he could be working with his dad right now rather than laying pinned under Sandy Ryerson and wanting to claw his own skin off.

And then his cell phone rings from across the room and he remembers that he never called his father to tell him he wasn’t coming.

Sandy ignores the strains of Lady Gaga and Beyonce, other than to speed up, and it’s over two minutes after the phone vibrates as the call goes to voicemail. Sandy slumps down on top of Kurt, crushing his ribs and making it difficult to breathe. Kurt can’t stop shivering (he wants to call his dad, get out of here, pretend this never happened, but instead he knows he’s going to have to make up a really good lie to get his father to not worry).

Sandy eventually pulls out of him with a little sigh and rolls off. Kurt takes deep breaths so he won’t gasp for air now that the pressure’s gone, and once he can trust himself to speak coherently, he murmurs, “I should tell my dad I’m not coming.”

Sandy rolls his eyes exaggeratedly. “You silly thoughtless thing, you. If you’d done that hours ago, we wouldn’t have had to interrupt things.” He gives Kurt a light shove on the shoulder, almost playful. “Let him know you’ll be a few hours yet, will you, doll?”

Kurt nods and carefully gets off the bed, gasping a little and momentarily ruining his blank expression at the pain the movement brings, but he recovers by the time he’s on his feet. He takes the phone into the living room and shakily hits the buttons to return a missed call.

“Kurt!” His father’s voice comes in loud and panicked after the first ring. “The Jones girl said you left school. Where are you?”

“I’m fine, Dad,” Kurt says, not quite able to project the confidence he aims for in the face of his father’s overwhelming worry. “I’m over at the park, something came up.”

“What do you mean, ‘something came up,’ I thought we had plans. What’s going on? Are you okay?”

He closes his eyes. He can imagine his dad’s face right now, brow furrowed, wrinkles deepening around his mouth as he tries to cover up his fear on his son’s behalf. “I’m fine,” he says too softly.

“You don’t sound fine,” Burt says, his voice tight.

“I am,” Kurt lies. “I really am. I just… It was a long day. I needed to get out for a bit.”

“Come home, then,” Burt says, and Kurt presses the phone closer to him as if it were his dad, able to protect him. “We don’t have to work in the shop. I’ll take the afternoon off. We can watch your Riverdance tape if you want.”

Kurt bites his lip hard and squeezes his eyes shut. Suddenly, it’s too much. He’s surprised he can hold onto the phone with the way his hands are shaking. “I… I can’t,” he manages to choke out. “I’ll be home in a few hours, okay? I love you, Dad. I love you so much.”

“Wait, Kurt, what do you mean? Look, just come home, I don’t care what’s going on so long as you’re okay. Dammit, talk to me!”

Kurt can barely keep a grip on his cell and can’t bring himself to answer.

“Kurt, you still there? Whatever’s wrong, just – just talk to me, we’ll work it out. We can do this, okay? You’re all I got. Let me take care of you, I promise I won’t get mad or whatever you’re-“

Kurt holds the phone away from his ear and hits the ‘end call’ button with a dry sob.

He can’t do this.


	7. Chapter 7

Kurt realizes that his whole body is shaking again, and he wraps his arms around his naked chest and feels like he’s going to fall apart. Everything hurts and he keeps hearing his father’s voice trying desperately to reach him. If he leaves now, he’s all too aware that Mr. Ryerson will find him again at school, and if he still tries to refuse him, he'll just move on to Puck. Puck will break after the first time, Kurt knows, and he doesn’t want to be responsible for someone else’s dead eyes (how far did it go with Hank Saunders before Rachel caught him, he wonders). And even if he can keep Puck away from him somehow, there are hundreds of students at McKinley (and the sudden thought that Mr. Ryerson knows Finn Hudson nearly as well as he knows Noah Puckerman sends fresh fear stabbing down Kurt’s spine).

He can’t let this go on, but he can’t leave, either.

The thought of escape tugs insidiously at his mind, comforting and tempting in equal measure. He bites his lip until teeth almost break through skin. No. Selfish. Kurt clutches himself tighter. He won’t be selfish, not now, it would kill his father (“you’re all I got,” he hears like a mantra).

He feels the weight of months of concerned looks as if they can physically smother him and his mind races helplessly. His friends are going to figure it out. If Mercedes has already called his dad, it won’t be long until Kurt can’t put her off anymore, and he’ll have to push her away for good if he wants to keep her safe (and a life lived without Mercedes, knowing he’s hurt her as badly as he’ll have to if he’s to chase her off, is a gut-wrenching prospect). His father knows something is wrong now, even if he only suspected before, and even if Kurt will never be the son his dad wanted, he knows that Burt would still destroy himself if it meant keeping Kurt safe. He hears Mr. Ryerson shifting impatiently in the other room and struggles to bring his ragged breaths under control. He’s taking too long, he knows, but he can’t make himself go back.

His phone keeps vibrating in his fist with missed calls.

Stalling, he shakily brings it up again to look at the screen. Six missed calls, five new texts. It starts to ring again, so he quickly hits the ‘ignore call’ button. The current name on the screen is “Mercedes.”

Sandy coughs irritably in the other room. Kurt stares at the phone. He comes to a decision.

Kurt absently watches as the call goes to voicemail, no longer aware of the hundreds of glass eyes staring down at him or the trembling in his entire frame, and feels like a stranger in his own body as he lifts a shaky finger and hits ‘3’ on speed dial.

“Mercedes,” he says quietly as soon as she picks up. He hears his own voice as if from a distance. “361 High Street. Call the police.”

And then he hangs up and turns off his phone before she can respond or he can be tempted to say anything else. There’s a ringing in his ears as he walks back into the bedroom and slides onto the bed beside Sandy. Sandy chides him lightly for taking so long, but doesn’t seem to notice that his body is thrumming with tension. Kurt thinks he might fly apart if he moves too quickly, so he allows Sandy to pull him close and tenderly pet his skin and he is almost surprised by the stinging dampness in his eyes.

 

Mr. Ryerson is inside him again by the time they hear the siren. At first, he doesn’t stop, but when the sound draws nearer and nearer to the house, he stops moving. He stares hard at Kurt beneath him and his mouth tightens as he eyes the tear-tracks streaking Kurt’s face (he had paid them little attention before except to frown in dissatisfaction and perfunctorily dab them off with the edge of the sheet) and his unprecedented failure to hide the pain.

The look of dawning realization is followed closely by fury. Sandy grabs his face harshly and Kurt isn’t able to keep the fear out of his eyes as Sandy forces him to meet his pale gaze. “Well, then,” is all Mr. Ryerson says, the cold anger in his voice freezing Kurt helplessly in place. He narrows his eyes and uses his free hand to grab the washcloth he used to clean Kurt earlier. Before Kurt can do more than tense up, the cloth is in his mouth, nearly choking him, and Sandy is using his thin scarf from that day to tie it in place. Kurt begins to fight, trying to roll out from under him, to pull the salty choking rag out of his mouth, but Sandy lowers his weight onto his hips to pin him down and gives the ends of the scarf a final jerk to tighten the knot.

Sandy only winces slightly as Kurt’s fist land heavily on his chest before he catches both of his wrists and captures them in one hand, squeezing hard enough that Kurt can feel his bones grinding together painfully. Sandy’s pale eyes dart about the room as the siren stops and wheels screech in front of the house, and then he looks down and smiles.

Sandy reaches down with his free hand and grips Kurt’s throat hard. Kurt’s eyes widen in panic and he tries to thrash about, but is held roughly in place the hands on his throat and wrists, and the hips pushing him down (Mr. Ryerson still hasn’t pulled out, and if Kurt had the leisure to focus on anything but getting away, getting a breath in, getting out of this alive, he’d be retching at the way he sighs in pleasure at Kurt's frantic movements). He struggles to get enough air through his nose as he writhes fruitlessly, but between the gag and the pressure on his windpipe, it’s not working. Kurt feels lightheaded and darkness is starting to creep in around the edges of his vision.

Suddenly he’s crumpled on the floor next to Sandy’s feet and he thinks he must have blacked out for a few seconds because he can’t remember how he got there. The hand is off his throat, though, and now he’s able to take fast breaths through his nose, so he tries to remember how to move. Sandy is lifting the lid of the ugly mahogany linen chest that sits beside the bed and Kurt’s just aware enough to know this is a bad thing, so he rolls onto his knees and tries to scramble away. Sandy has finished opening the chest by now and lunges to grip his upper arm before he can get more than a few feet, yanking him back against the chest so hard that he gets rug burn and the back of his head crashes against the wood.

Panicked and trying to fight the new wave of disorientation, Kurt lashes out, kicking at any part of Sandy he can reach, but there’s a hand in his hair and Sandy slams his head back against the trunk again. Kurt’s vision goes black and the dull ache of the impact is immediately followed by pain so sharp he has to fight not to throw up (if he does now, he’s fuzzily aware that it will kill him).

Through the daze, he can sort of hear pounding and someone yelling something from outside, and Sandy unconcernedly trills “Hold your horses, I’m coming!” As he shouts, Sandy grabs Kurt and manhandles him into the open trunk, pushing him down on top of heaps of sheets and quilts. Kurt struggles to sit up, but the lid descends before he can move and slams down less than an inch above his face (the last thing he sees is Mr. Ryerson as he turns his head to call some explanation across the house), and then he’s entombed in total darkness.

The lock clicks.

He can hear Sandy puttering around quickly, and the closet door opens and closes – he dazedly assumes he hid his clothing – followed by the door to the bedroom. Kurt struggles to pull in breaths and has to fight back nausea again when he smells lavender on the sheets surrounding him, doesn’t let himself think about the fact that there’s not much oxygen available in the enclosed space. He can’t hear anything except for the siren, almost totally muffled by the trunk and the doors between him and the police, and tries not to panic.

Kurt pushes up on the lid as hard as he can, but it’s locked and he has to give up (sweating and shivering and starting to take fast desperate breaths). He briefly tries to hammer on it with his fists and finds he’s too close to get enough force to make any sound. Kurt whimpers, but the noise is muffled by the soiled rag in his mouth. There’s an endless minute in which he can do nothing but fight for breath and let the tears run down his cheeks and ignore the bitter cotton taste while he ruins his nails by desperately clawing at the seam between trunk and lid, his chest heaving wildly. Then the siren stops.

Kurt chokes a stifled sob and redoubles his efforts, ignoring the pain as splinters lodge under his nails. They can’t leave, not now, not when he finally did something right and it could get him killed, but one car door slams, and then the other, and in a minute he’s going to be left alone with Mr. Ryerson.

Just as he imagines the squad car must be turning on its engine and horrified despair begins to edge its way through the panic, he hears a new screech of tires from outside, a commotion of voices and Kurt frantically tries to shout. No sound gets past the gag, but the voices get closer and more distinct and the bedroom door slams open.

“-don’t care what the fucker said, the kid’s here somewhere!”

Puck’s voice. Adrenaline blazes through the panic and Kurt starts trying to pound on the lid again, but he still can’t get the leverage even when he tries to kick at the heavy wood. The stale air is getting thinner. There are other voices, too, and it sounds like they’re yelling, but a new one cuts through the jumble of noise.

“You have to look! He told me here, my boy wouldn’t be making this up-“

Mercedes.

Kurt doesn’t know why Puck’s here as well, but he wheezes, fights to get enough lavender-saturated air into his lungs and keeps up his attempts to kick the heavy wood above him, barely manages a soft thudding that’s obscured by the ongoing argument, anyway. An unfamiliar voice is protesting, “You can’t just go in-“ a door opens while the unfamiliar man is saying something about “breaking and entering” and “-understand your concern, but prank calls happen,” but he’s cut off by Puck’s hissed “Fuck!”

A second of silence, and Mercedes shrilly screams, “That’s his uniform, he is here, you have to look for him!” She sounds hysterical, but there’s the sound of activity and someone is pounding on the lid of the trunk and Kurt tries to pound back but he still can’t even scream and Sandy Ryerson’s voice is protesting something from the doorway.

Sandy’s voice is cut off mid-word by the sound of an impact and Mercedes yelling angrily. There’s hectic commotion, a babble of voices rising above each other, but Kurt can’t pay it any attention because something is scratching at the keyhole and then it clicks and the lid is thrown open hard enough to send reverberations through the heavy wood structure. Kurt squints against the rush of air and sudden light. Puck’s face is hovering above him, looking horrified.

Kurt can’t care that he’s naked and tear-streaked and bruising from the rough handling earlier, although Puck is swearing brokenly as he becomes aware of these facts. Kurt grabs the edge of the trunk, barely noticing that his fingertips are torn up and bleeding sluggishly from where he clawed fruitlessly at the wood, and pulls himself out, half-falling out onto the floor.

He means to land on his feet or at least his knees, but the world is still too bright and spinning a little, so he ends up in an ungraceful heap at Puck’s feet instead. He accidentally flinches away from Puck’s hand when he crouches down and tries to help him up, but only spares the white-faced teen a brief look before warily taking in the room, almost afraid of what he’ll see.

There are two police officers in the room, one of them with a hand gripping Sandy’s shoulder, another holding back a furious Mercedes (which Kurt assumes explains his rapidly-forming black eye). Mr. Ryerson stands tense and livid, glaring at Kurt in a way that makes him want to apologize frantically and do anything he says, but Sandy is held in place by the first police officer. The others look like they’ve frozen in place, but the second Kurt flinches away from Sandy’s gaze long enough to make eye contact with her, Mercedes lets out a strangled cry and breaks away from the officer, dashing over and falling to her knees in front of him.

“Oh, God,” she whispers desperately, arms going around him in a fast hug before she reaches behind his head to untie the makeshift gag. “Kurt- Oh God. Baby, what did he do to you?”

As soon as the scarf isn’t holding it in, Kurt yanks the washcloth out of his mouth and coughs, choking in breaths.

Puck is still crouched beside them, looking horrified and confused and trying to keep his distance. Then he turns his head abruptly to look at Sandy, narrows his eyes, and rises to his feet with a snarl.

Kurt buries his face in Mercedes’ shoulder so he doesn’t have to look and see that Sandy Ryerson is still glaring at him even while handcuffs click and one of the officers drones out a procedural warning (he can still feel it, though, and clings shivering to Mercedes like a lifeline).

And then Puck isn’t next to them anymore, but across the room, and the sound of fist meeting flesh cracks through the room and Puck’s screaming something. One of he officers says something sharply and tries to calm him down, but even though there isn’t the sound of any more punches (Kurt assumes they’re holding Puck back, as he isn’t known for his impulse control), Puck is still yelling. All Kurt can make out is varied repetitions of “you sick fuck,” but he just closes his eyes tighter and huddles closer to his best friend, who clings back just as tightly. “I got you,” Mercedes murmurs, “I got you, baby. He’s not going to hurt you anymore, okay?” Kurt can feel dampness on his bare shoulder and only figures out why when he hears the hitch in Mercedes’ voice.

He’s not looking up or listening to anything but Mercedes, so he doesn’t know exactly why Puck stops shouting, but when he hears the bedroom door close, he raises his eyes to see that Sandy and one of the officers have left the room. Puck is glaring at the closed door with his hands clenched into fists at his sides, practically vibrating with anger. The remaining officer makes his way across the room to cautiously crouch down beside Kurt and Mercedes.

“Are you alright?” the officer asks. The man’s face is drawn and he appears a little nauseous, steadily looking at Kurt’s face rather than his unclothed body.

Kurt automatically goes to say ‘I’m fine,’ but his throat hurts from being choked twice today and Mercedes’ arms tighten around him and now she’s shaking, too. Now that Sandy’s out of the room, Kurt is also able to notice that there’s a faint ringing sound and time seems to be progressing oddly, like the world is on a split-second delay. “I don’t know,” he says instead. His head hurts.

The officer nods. Kurt can tell that he’s trying to be businesslike and reassuring, but can’t quite manage to keep the discomfort out of his expression. “My partner is calling an ambulance. Do you have anyone you want to call?”

“I already called his dad,” Mercedes says, shifting to look at the man but not letting go of Kurt. Kurt tenses up, and his friend notices, because she turns to purse her lips at him. The concern in her eyes belies the annoyance of the gesture, and she softly tells him “He has to know. He’s been calling me since you didn’t show up after practice, he’s really worried.” Her eyes soften even more and Kurt feels terrible when her voice shakes. “I was really worried.”

He winces and opens his mouth to speak, but Mercedes cuts him off sharply, knowing him too well, as always. “Don’t apologize. Don’t you dare.” He frowns and tries again, but she stops him with another emphatic, “No! Later, we’ll talk about what’s been going on with you, but for now, we’re getting you help.”

Puck shifts uncomfortably by the door, hands in pockets, eyes everywhere but on Kurt. “Damn, Hummel, just – just let us help you out, okay?”

Puck looks wretched enough that Kurt doesn’t protest, just lets Mercedes help him get dressed – his hands are still trembling too hard after the sudden drop in adrenaline to manage it alone – and allows Puck to open doors for him (he stands as far back from Kurt as he can, as if afraid of breaking him) as Mercedes leads him out of the room, out of the house of dolls.

“I’m sorry,” Puck says abruptly as Kurt passes through the front door (the cool outside air feels like a rebirth).

Kurt stares at him. “What for?” His voice still sounds ruined and harsh, but Mercedes is holding his hand tightly and it’s all he can do to focus on anything but the fact that he’s out of Sandy’s house and still alive.

Puck looks up, meeting his eyes for the first time since he got the trunk open. “I left you with him,” he says, jaw tight with anger and guilt. “Last week, right? On Friday. You kept fucking warning me and I didn’t even think – I should have known.”

Kurt looks away, at the quiet street and Puck’s old truck parked badly and the houses with neat paint jobs and white shutters, and shrugs uncomfortably. “It wasn’t your fault. I didn’t want you to figure it out.”

“But I should have. And, Jesus, Tuesday-“

Kurt cuts him off. He doesn’t want to hear the guilt in Puck’s voice, because none of it is Puck’s fault and Kurt knows he’s the only one of them with cause for self-loathing right now. “You had no reason to think anything, Puck,” he assures him softly.

Mercedes squeezes his hand. “Artie told me that he,” there’s no question who ‘he’ is, Kurt suspects she won’t be ready to use the name for a long time, “called you out of class today. Was that…” She lets the question trail off.

Kurt stares ahead and doesn’t answer. A siren is faintly audible in the distance, growing nearer by the second.

The police officer coughs. “You two can go with him to the hospital if his dad doesn’t show up,” Kurt flinches slightly and Mercedes lets go of his hand to wrap an arm around his shoulders, “but I’m going to need statements from both of you.”

Kurt doesn’t know if they answer that, because a familiar car is stopping just behind Puck’s and suddenly everything is out of focus but this. The world narrows down to Burt Hummel tumbling out and slamming the car door, heedless of the engine left running, and pounding across the manicured lawn to grab Kurt by the shoulders, grip firm and solid and real. His dad looks him up and down (Kurt can see the naked fear when he sees the bruises on his neck and wrists, the way he’s not standing quite straight), then pulls him into a rough embrace.

Kurt reflexively flinches away from contact with a larger male body, but it’s his father and the familiar scent of oil and home overwhelms the lingering taint of lavender, so he tentatively brings up his arms to hug him back. Burt looks wrecked and terrified and everything he wanted to avoid. Then he hears his dad gruffly whispering “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, god, I should have-“ and he just loses it.

He’s not aware of Mercedes or Puck or the police officer or the ambulance pulling up anymore, just his father’s solid presence holding him together as he lets out a choked cry, followed by uncontrollable sobs. It’s messy and undignified – he’s pretty sure his nose is running all over his dad’s flannel shirt – but Burt holds him close and doesn’t let go as Kurt clings and chokes out “I love you” and “it’s my fault” and a thousand “I’m sorry”s.

Eventually, Burt has to reluctantly let go of him when the paramedics insist they need to look him over. He looks on with Mercedes and Puck as one of them frowns over the lump on the back of Kurt’s head, but when Kurt is lifted into the ambulance, Mercedes and Puck are led away to follow the police officer to the station and Burt insists on riding in the ambulance with him. He clutches his son’s hand the whole way there and mercifully doesn’t ask for explanations just yet. Kurt just breathes deeply and takes every second as it comes.


	8. End

The front doors of William McKinley High School have never looked so intimidating. Kurt’s hand hesitates on the handle of the car door and Burt picks up on it immediately.

“You don’t have to do this,” his father’s uncharacteristically gentle voice reminds him from the driver’s seat. “My offer of movies and pizza still stands.”

Kurt’s lips twitch in an attempted smile. “I know.” He takes a deep breath and pulls the lever, swings the door open. “But I need to go.” He knows the news of Sandy’s arrest will go public soon, and even if the newspaper can’t mention Kurt’s name in relation to the case, he still isn’t looking forward to that. He wants to have at least one last normal day at school. In the best-case scenario, there might be a fresh outbreak of misplaced homophobia when the story breaks, and Kurt is always the easiest target for gay panic. In the worst case… Gossip travels through McKinley like Ebola most days. Mercedes and Puck won’t say anything, but all it will take is one person noticing the bruises on Kurt’s neck, the way he’s flinched away from contact for the past few weeks, and the entire school will know. If he skips today, it will be even worse.

So he straightens his oversized scarf, gives the cuffs of his color-coordinated gloves one last twitch, and forces himself to get out of the car. “You already made me miss first period,” he reminds his dad with an arched eyebrow and fond smile (the smile isn’t entirely forced, he really did appreciate Burt’s attempt at waffles after convincing him to sleep in). “And I have a Spanish test this afternoon that I really don’t want to make up.”

Burt gives him a long look as he closes the door, and quickly rolls down the window. “Just call me,” he says. There’s a look in his dad’s eyes that Kurt knows means, ‘I don’t want to let you out of my sight today’ and ‘What are you doing, you spent all of last night at the hospital and the police station, you broke down twice,’ but his father just says, “I’ll pick you up. No questions asked.”

Kurt nods and pretends he doesn’t see that Burt’s knuckles are white on the steering wheel. “I know. Thank you.”

Before his father can convince him to get back in the car and go home to curl up under a quilt and watch movies together, Kurt makes himself turn around and strut defiantly into the school just as the bells ring.

He isn’t surprised that Mercedes is waiting just inside the door, as he texted her to let her know he’d be late, but he is surprised by Puck’s presence.

“Hey, baby,” Mercedes greets him, linking her arm into his.

“’Sup, Hummel.” Puck nods, though the gesture is laced less with machismo than concern, for once.

Kurt sighs as Mercedes pulls him toward their next class, Puck ambling along on his other side.

“If this is a guilt thing, I’d rather if you didn’t,” Kurt informs him quietly. “You don’t owe me anything.”

Puck shrugs, “Whatever.” There’s still a wariness in his eyes and he holds himself more stiffly than before, too careful not to invade Kurt’s personal space, but he looks unruffled as he informs Kurt, “I want to do this, okay? And now I know when you’re trying to scare me off, so it’s not going to work again.”

Mercedes reaches up with her free hand to give Kurt’s shoulder a little squeeze. “And I had better not catch you trying it. We’re here for you and we’re staying, got it?”

Kurt looks from one face to the other, sees the determination and (misplaced) guilt there, and gives up. “I feel like Dorothy,” he complains, eyeing the way they’re walking three abreast, Mercedes arm-in-arm with him. “Except instead of 1939 Technicolor, we get bad early-nineties Midwestern chic."

Mercedes chuckles. “Okay, Puck may be the scarecrow here,” Puck scowls, but doesn’t bother working out the dig, “and those are some seriously fierce shoes today, but I have far too much soul to be the Tin Woodsman and you are certainly no Dorothy.” Kurt makes a face at her for deconstructing his snarky comment – she knows he hates when she does that – but she grins at him as they enter the classroom, confident and reassuring and still trying too hard to stamp out the sadness. “Elphaba, all the way.” She gives his arm one last squeeze before reluctantly letting go so he can go to his seat. “And baby, we’ll get you flying again.”


End file.
